Bakugan: Still Standing

Look


Mira had been doing a lot of thinking since witnessing the Ventus tournament. Between the Vexos lookalikes and the strange illnesses, there were just too many suspicious things going on that Mira couldn't just not investigate. She had to find out who the culprits of this strange illness were, and find out the identity of the masked brawlers who were these culprits.

Besides, Marucho was too stressed as it was, and if she wasn't going to do it, who would?

Anyway, she'd seen some of the Ventus competitors who'd battled Speed after the Ventus tournament. As soon as they had left Interspace, these competitors began feeling lightheaded. It was only a few moments later that they began developing a stomach bug of sorts. Mira knew it had to be Speed's doing. She'd spoken to each of them, and there was just no other common factor. Besides, she'd reviewed footage of the tournament, and noticed that he'd been deliberate in making sure the Brawlers he'd faced were at least grazed by each attack from his Ventus Hawktor. According to Marucho, those in Speed's group during registrations had been the same.

Mira came to the conclusion that it was that Ventus Hawktor that was causing the illnesses for the Ventus Brawlers. It was his attack that would target the Brawlers who would get ill. That meant that the ill competitors of the other attributes had to have been targeted by a Brawler with a real Bakugan in order to have gotten this suspicious illness. Virtual Bakugan, of course, could cause no actual damage. Marucho had done enough research to prove it ten times over.

As far as Mira was aware, however, the only ones to use real Bakugan during Tournament Week (besides the masked brawlers) were Dan, Runo, Julie, Alice, Klaus, Komba, Billy, Chan, Spectra during the Darkus tournament, Gus, Fabia, Linus, Ren, Lena, Jesse, and Zenet. No one else (not even Baron, herself, or the Vexos lookalikes) had used real Bakugan.

Nevertheless, the other culprits could have been any of these people. Though Mira wouldn't know this for sure unless she went into Marucho's registration records.

She could, however, eliminate Dan, Billy, Lena, Jesse, as well as Komba from the suspect list. The reason being that they'd all been affected by the illness.

It was strange, though. The ones causing the chaos for the Aquos, Pyrus, Subterra, and Haos affiliated Brawlers could have been anyone that had entered the tournament.... Mira didn't know for sure who did and who didn't have a real Bakugan unless she looked at Marucho's records. They didn't even know the identities of the two who had "revealed" themselves, Speed and Strength.

Of course, she could logically figure out who the culprit was. For example, the Subterra culprit had to have battled the ones who'd gotten sick from the Subterra tournament: Billy and a girl named Paige. Since both of them had gotten sick, and you had to have been in different groups during registrations to get into the tournament, Mira concluded that the Subterra culprit had to have been the one who battled them both during the tournament.

Done. Easy.

... Except, not really.

Using this logic, the culprit had to have been Julie, the only one to fight both Paige and Billy during Tournament Week.

Mira currently stood in the stands, watching both Speed and Strength (the Ventus and Darkus culprits) stand in the center of the arena as four other masked brawlers approach the two from hidden spots beside the stands. Around the stands, all of the victims from the six tournaments were slumped over, unconscious. All of the masker brawlers wore cloaks, and had glowing tattoos of some sort in the colors of their affiliated attribute. Mira could see that all of the victims had black versions of these tattoos, not glowing.

In the announcers box, Mira could see Marucho and the other staff in a panic. At the gates of the arena, Mira could see the other Darkus Brawlers run up to the gates from backstage to see what was going on, though not all of them were there, and only Alice and Spectra were conscious.

Towards the front of the stands where the Pyrus and Subterra Brawlers sat was Julie, frantically trying to wake Billy and Dan as their three Bakugan floated above their heads.

Julie could not be sitting there, showing that much emotion, and stand with the other masked brawlers at the same time. It was impossible.

Besides, it was flawed logic to assume that the culprits had to have battled all of the victims during the tournament. The victims could have easily been targeted anytime during Tournament Week, not just during the actual tournaments or the registrations. There were many Ventus victims who were a testament to this, since Komba and many others had never battled Speed during the tournament, but had obviously come into contact with him at one point to have gotten sick.

So far, the only thing she knew for sure was that the culprit had to have been using a real Bakugan, had to have fought at least some of the victims during the tournaments, and could not be any of the people sitting in the stands watching all six culprits stand in a circle in the center of the arena.

It was impossible, however, to count and check who was absent to figure out who the culprits were. There were many absent from even just the Pyrus and Subterra section: Chan, Linus, Gus, the Hydron lookalike, and countless others were missing from the stands at the present moment. Not to mention the absent people from the other attributes, the culprits could have been any of these people, it was impossible to tell.


By far what made the least sense, however, was just how many people were affected.

Mira knew for a fact that everyone in the stands had at least registered for the tournament, since you had to be a Brawler to come to Interspace and watch a match live. Anyone who wasn't a Brawler was watching the tournament on television.

Using this knowledge, roughly only about an eighth of the attendees of each attribute should have been unconscious by the mysterious illness at the present moment. This was due to the fact that, during registrations, the culprits could have only come into contact with the brawlers of their individual group. This amount plus those who had been targeted both during the actual tournament and outside of it; there should have been roughly around an eighth of competitors of each attribute to have fallen to this strange illness. The fact that not all of the competitors would be watching the battle from the stands, or that some brawlers would be too shy to enter would allow for some flexibility. But in the end, the masked brawlers could have only battled and tainted so many people.

This theory, however, was completely inaccurate, and Mira had no idea why.

The Aquos and Ventus stand was nearly completely decimated. There must have been hundreds of people affiliated with all attributes watching the Darkus tournament, and yet there were only half a dozen survivors of the Aquos and Ventus attributes combined. While the Subterra Brawlers followed Mira's estimation more closely, there were still way more victims than there should have been. Not to mention, the majority of Pyrus Brawlers had also fallen victim, though not to the extent of the Aquos and Ventus victims.

In addition, Brawlers of each attribute had been encouraged by Marucho to wear the colors of their attribute on their respective days of the tournament, even if they weren't competing. It was for this reason that Mira could tell that at least half of the Darkus affiliated attendees had fallen victim, including the tournament competitors who were not conscious enough to run to the arena from backstage like Alice and Spectra had.

Mira supposed the anomalies in numbers may have had something to do with the illnesses needing a longer time to fully develop to the point where the six masker brawlers could make the victims faint and gain strange black tattoos on command. But, there was no way of telling the technicalities of the illnesses, there was just too much that they didn't know.

Besides, there was just one technicality that debunked this theory that the illnesses could wipe out large amounts of people with time...

Not one of the Haos affiliated Brawlers had fallen victim.

Not

a

single

one.

Mira couldn't figure out why. What was it about the Aquos and especially the Ventus competitors that made them so vulnerable, while the Haos brawlers were unscathed? There were very clearly six masked brawlers standing in the center of the arena, Mira wasn't blind. She just couldn't understand.


To conclude, Mira knew that the six standing in the center of the arena caused their opponents to have had some sort of strange illness after their real Bakugan grazed the Brawler with an attack. She also knew that the illness had a different affect on the Brawler depending on their affiliated attribute, and that it was the reason why the majority of the Brawlers in Interspace were unconscious with brand-new tattoos.

She also knew that the identities of the six could be anyone. The fact that it had to be someone that possessed a real Bakugan and was not one of the victims nor one of the ones standing and watching the scene did not aid in narrowing it down. Anyone could be possessing a real Bakugan without Mira's knowledge, even those air-headed pop-stars JJ Dolls.

She knew that the strange lookalikes of the Vexos were too suspicious to not be connected somehow. Though she knew for sure that the Lync, Mylene, and Shadow lookalikes were passed out like so many others, the status of the Hydron lookalike was iffy (despite the fact that he should have definitely been in the stands for all of the tournaments, having been defeated by Gus in registrations). Volt, however, was most definitely unscathed.

Oh, and she also knew that the Haos affiliated Brawlers were immune somehow.

Not that any of this speculation helped any.

She needed to take action.