(æ)mæth Chapter 10: X, a yu-gi-oh! arc-v fanfic

Rokkaku Yuki rose up from her armchair in the living room, marking the page in her book before setting it aside with an ill-concealed yawn. It was almost midnight—and she'd never felt more tired all week.

Yuki had never claimed to be a night owl, ironically enough for someone who'd been married to an astronomer for the past fifteen years. That distinction had belonged to Taiyou, who'd often gone days without sleeping in the past, so interested was he in the night sky. Since opening this planetarium, those days were fewer and farther between—something Yuki had thanked her lucky stars for—and caring for their son had made them practically nonexistent.

Speaking of her son … She stifled another yawn, but Taiyou, sitting on the couch across from her, had noticed.

"Heading to bed, Yuki?"

"Not quite," she replied to her husband. "I want to check up on Fuyu and his friends one last time before I do—make sure they aren't causing any trouble for him in there."

"Mm. I don't think you ought to worry about that," shrugged Taiyou as he pored through tonight's e-mail on his tablet. "They seem well-behaved enough—well," he added, "altogether, at least. That little girl Masumi brought with her sounds like she was quite the handful; Masumi was watching her all day, too—I'm surprised she didn't fall asleep while she was Dueling Fuyu."

He shrugged again. "Still, I think the rest of them are mature enough to know to be mindful around our son."

Yuki knew that he had a point. Masumi had been quite polite to them both—if somewhat reserved, as though there was something that she didn't want to tell them. Yaiba was his usual self, even if he looked like he'd mellowed out recently. Both parents had pretended not to hear snippets of the heated conversation the two Duelists had exchanged earlier that night, however—not that it had really mattered; they'd been tactful enough to take it outside so no one would have to get dragged into any unnecessary drama—and whatever they'd been arguing about, Masumi and Yaiba had both walked back in as though nothing had happened between them.

Now they were all inside the theater of the planetarium, sound asleep after what had sounded like a very busy day, especially for kids their age. Kids were still kids, however, no matter how well-behaved they were; Yuki had a feeling that at least one of them was still staying up later than they ought to be. It was a sleepover, yes, but it was also Fuyu's first sleepover. She didn't doubt that he'd been the first one of them to fall asleep—and while Taiyou had convinced himself everything would be fine, Yuki had been the one to bear their only son and give birth to him—in her mind, that made her all the more responsible for making sure Fuyu wasn't regretting his choice.

"I'll peek in for only a minute," she reassured her husband, "and then I'll turn in for the night." She planted a kiss on Taiyou's forehead. "Don't stay up too late, okay?"

"When have I ever?" Taiyou said wryly. Yuki couldn't help but laugh at the hypocritical humor, and she continued to titter even as they bade each other goodnight.

It took less than a minute for her to take the stairs up to the main level of the planetarium and cross the hallway to the theater. She'd been checking them every hour on the hour to make sure everything was okay, but hadn't been unduly worried; all five children were sound asleep before she'd come up the first time. They'd left a mess of papers behind, though, which was mildly annoying—Yuki would have to talk to them about cleaning up after themselves before they went home tomorrow morning. Curiously, most of those papers had been scribbled with notes about Duel Monsters, but as all five of them were students at LDS, Yuki shrugged it off as some sort of class project they were working on.

Quietly, she opened the door to the theater, tiptoeing inside as softly as her joints would let her. Not that anyone would have heard; Fuyu and all the others were still as sound asleep as they'd been the last time Yuki had come to check on them. If anything, she thought, they sounded even quieter than last time.

She frowned. That was odd; Fuyu had a tendency to make a sort of nasally wheeze every time he slept. Far from the log-sawing noises Taiyou used to make in the early years of their marriage, but still loud enough to be noticeable. Tonight, however, her son was as quiet as the grave.

Yuki knelt down beside her son; his long bangs were covering his nose and mouth as he slept. Smiling softly, she moved to gently brush away his hair so he could sleep more peacefully—

She recoiled, just barely stifling a curse in surprise. Her fingertips had just grazed the skin on Fuyu's forehead for barely an instant—but that instant was enough for her to register that he was freezing cold. Her motherly instinct kicked in, and she immediately pulled the blanket tighter over her son's body, trying to warm him up.

But something wasn't right. Yuki knew the HVAC automatically switched off after visitor hours to the planetarium had concluded, because there weren't nearly as many people in the planetarium afterward to heat up the space. So it couldn't have done this—made his skin feel so cold—

Then she noticed Fuyu's hair had once again fallen across his mouth and nose—but they weren't stirring in the slightest; even the tiniest of breaths would have caused them to flutter.

Now Yuki was concerned. Was Fuyu playing possum on her? He had no reason to do so—at least, none that she knew. She leaned close to his ear, knowing there was one way to find out.

"Fuyu?" she whispered, soft enough that no one else would stir, but loud enough for Fuyu to hear, and react in some way—but he did not. He remained lying there, completely still.

Yuki bit her lip, trying to calm herself as best she could—she could not shake the feeling that something was wrong. Slowly, gingerly, she pulled back a bit of the spacesuit that covered the side of Fuyu's neck, extended her index and middle fingers … touching the cold flesh, feeling for that one spot that could tell her for certain whether or not Fuyu was faking …

He was not.

Yuki really did swear at this point, and stumbled to her feet so quickly that she lost her balance, tumbling into Masumi's sleeping form. Masumi, however, did not stir—and a second after that, Yuki realized why.

She'd thrown out her hands to break her fall; in doing so, she'd accidentally grasped Masumi by her exposed neck. Yuki let go just as quickly, though, a hundred apologies already forming in her head—but each one vanished into oblivion an instant later as her fingers registered the same frigid skin of the Fusion user, the same lack of a pulse …

… and the same lack of breath.

Rokkaku Yuki turned in a complete circle, taking in the scene of the five silent children before her as a sudden terror clawed at her insides. Then, without even realizing it, she was pulling out her phone with fumbling fingers, and sprinting out of the theater as if possessed.

"Taiyou!" Her pleading scream cut through the silent planetarium like a knife as she dialed 119—the direct-dial number for emergency medical services. "Taiyou, get up here now! Something's wrong with Fuyu—oh, God, something's wrong with all of them! Taiyou!"

Even before the last word had left the speaker's lips, Masumi had taken several steps back in horror. As if it had carried some ancient, immeasurable magic, it had confirmed the sight unfolding right before her eyes—and yet, it made everything seem doubly unreal, even in this dream.

The willow-thin marionette standing atop the spine of El Shaddoll Midrash stood just as tall as Wendy, and had the same long green hair as Wendy—only it was thicker and much more rigid, as if the whole thing had been carved out of jointed wood. It even had the same threadbare, plum-colored overcoat that Masumi had seen Wendy wearing only this morning—but this too was stiff and jointed, and the wide purple sleeve on the arm that wasn't bearing her Duel Disk looked like nothing so much as a hollow purple cone. More of those infernal violet threads streamed from the puppet's body—some connected with the dragon imitation it stood upon, while others raced into the sky, linking up with the gigantic cloud-strings that bore silent witness to the Duel below.

And the face … Masumi had never before seen a puppet that had possessed a face so lifelike, yet so lifeless. The lustrous emerald eyes of Wendy, once shining with the prospect of talking to her favorite student, had no light left to them. They were soulless and empty now, yet in their depths there remained a dark flame—a malevolent spirit like none Masumi had ever felt before, even from Ito—and where there should have been pupils, there was a strange curly shape that no human eye should ever possess. Shadows danced across the carved lips of the mouth, twisting it into a wicked smile. Spiky black letters had been burned onto the puppet's face like macabre tattoos: a single m between Wendy's eyes, and a th on her left temple.

Æmæth, Masumi instinctively realized amidst her growing fear. Will that damned Word never end?!

"Don't look so surprised, Masumi dear." The puppet of Wendy even spoke with the same British accent she used—but there was none of the friendly warmth to her voice anymore; every word the puppet spoke carried a cold, almost mechanical sort of menace to it that made Masumi's blood freeze in her veins. "You were doing so well just now. All the pieces of the puzzle are within your grasp—now go on, put it all together."

She tittered under a jointed hand, and the coldness that gripped Masumi pierced further still into her heart. The Fusion user growled under her breath—no matter how much this puppet might look and sound like Wendy Grimm, this was not Wendy Grimm.

And yet …

"H-how?" Masumi finally found her voice, but even then, it only came out as a breathy whisper through her shock. "All this time … it was you all along, Wendy?"

"Wendy?" Yaiba asked from in front of her, frowning apprehensively. "This is that counselor you told us you were seeing?" When Masumi slowly nodded, his frown only deepened.

"To be precise, it's how young Masumi knows me best, Toudou Yaiba," corrected the puppet, "although now that she's seen the truth, there's no point in wearing that particular mask any longer—nor is there any further need of Ito, for that matter, even if that disguise was a personal favorite of mine. I can't say I miss being Wendy much, to be honest," she added, her tone unusually bitter. "I do so prefer my practical psychology to be a little more hands-on. But I understand now it was necessary I avoid Dueling as long as possible, to avert any suspicion falling upon me … "

She gave a shuddering moan that made Masumi shiver. Then—"Oh, how I've missed this for so very long, to no longer hide what I really am!" Dr. Grimm hissed. "I'd almost forgotten how good it feels, to be a wolf among the lambs once again!"

Masumi backed away. "Who—what are you?" she demanded—though her heart was not in it at all; the change that had suddenly come over the Wendy-puppet above her was scaring her beyond all reason.

The puppet laughed. "That's the wonderful thing about dreams, Masumi," she answered her. "If you put your mind to it, you can be anyone or anything you want to be. For example, I can be Wendy Grimm—mild-mannered student counselor at the Leo Duel School in Maiami City."

The shadows that danced over the puppet's mouth now fell away, revealing the wide smirk of a cat that had just cornered a family of mice. "Or ... I can be Dr. Gwendolyn Grimm—psi-level Duelist. Military rank: Lieutenant Colonel. Title: 'the Golem of Academia.'"

Academia. For some reason, the single word brought even more shivers down Masumi's spine. So that was it: they must be from the Fusion Dimension, she thought—and so was Dr. Grimm. Idly, she wondered if this Academia was a school like LDS … or something else completely. She thought of how Dr. Grimm had called herself a Lieutenant Colonel, and wondered if perhaps it was a military institution of some sort.

"I've come to know you quite well over these past few days, Masumi," Dr. Grimm was saying in the meantime. "Sooner or later, with or without my help, one of us was going to start dreaming about the other. I was counting on that someone being you—my powers don't work quite so well on the unwilling."

"Powers?" Hotene, who'd gone so long without piping up that Masumi jumped, had been staring wide-eyed at the puppet as if it had grown a second head.

"Just because you're dreaming doesn't have to mean that what you're seeing here isn't real, darling," Dr. Grimm acknowledged the little girl. "I'm not some mere manifestation of your mind—and neither are the children who are Dueling alongside you. We are all here, dreaming the same dream—my dream. As much as I'd like to say this all happened because of me, though, none of it might ever have started at all if someone else weren't so eager."

The dead eyes of the puppet swiveled towards Masumi, whose shock had only intensified. What does she mean, her dream?

Wait. What does she mean, we're all here?!

"Hmm … perhaps another explanation is in order," Dr. Grimm said, apparently being able to read Masumi's mind. "I'm what you might call a Psychic Duelist—a person gifted with extraordinary powers that enhance their Dueling abilities in ways normal people can never be capable of."

"What're you trying to tell us?" Yaiba said uneasily. "That you can read minds?"

Masumi tensed at this, and the puppet's smile grew frighteningly wide. Psychic?!

"Oh, dear, no," Dr. Grimm purred. "I can do much, much more than that." She tapped the polished porcelain skin beneath her rigid green hair. "This blessed brain of mine can chain itself to another person's subconscious. Not just anyone, mind you; I have to get close to them, first—whether in body, mind, or soul. But when I do, I'm able to appear inside their dreams as anything I wish—a whisper, a Shadow … even flesh and blood."

The smirk on her face lengthened even more. "That's when the fun really begins."

The marionette reached outward with her hand—the one that carried her Duel Disk—and made a fist. That Duel Disk, Masumi now saw, was beginning to glow with a faint yellow light. Suddenly, that light flared once, and the apparatus disintegrated into a million pieces—then, just as suddenly, reformed into a Duel Disk once again … but not the same Duel Disk.

Masumi saw the shield-like construction of the purple device, and the swordblade hovering parallel that glowed with the same navy light as before, for only a moment—and it served as further confirmation of what she already knew.

"Go-between, my foot," she growled. "I've seen that style of Duel Disk before! You're one of those invaders who attacked us a week ago! You aren't just connected to the Fusion Dimension—you're from the Fusion Dimension!"

Dr. Grimm laughed. "Right again, Masumi. I still didn't participate in the invasion outright—it was imperative even then that I maintain my cover inside LDS. But even so, the Professor of Academia thinks quite a bit more highly of me than he does of the girl who got rid of that Xyz slime over there." Her eyes narrowed, alighting upon the echo of Shijima Hokuto with all the finesse of a blade slicing homeward for the kill.

Hokuto bristled at the insult. "Say that a little louder, why don't you?"

"Don't you dare talk about my friend that way!" Fuyu growled at her; for the first time, he sounded angry.

"Oh, don't be so quick to judge," Dr. Grimm hmphed. "To be quite frank, I actually envy the boy—compared to what's in store for the rest of you lot, being sealed into a card is a paradise. Unfortunately for you, though, I don't bother with the whole sealing-into-a-card routine—that's grunt work; I leave that to the Obelisk Force and their ilk. My powers aren't just limited to controlling dreams, you see."

Controlling. "Then this was your dream from the beginning?" Masumi realized out loud, gazing at the ruined Maiami City around her as if seeing it for the first time. "Even when I Dueled you two nights ago … I was already being affected by your powers, wasn't I?"

The puppet of Dr. Grimm pursed her rigid lips—again, Masumi remembered, just like Wendy had done in their first meeting. "Yes," she eventually said, "and no. Most of this dream was my design, yes, but I merely built upon the cornerstone you laid, Masumi. This is your dream—your own memories are the basis of this entire world—but I've added on so much to this dream world that it might as well be mine. As I said," she added, "if you weren't so eager to beat me, then we might never have come to this point—and none of you might be in the danger you're in right now."

"What danger?" Yaiba shouted. "Unless you're lurking outside Fuyu's planetarium right now, there's no way we're in danger!"

Dr. Grimm tittered again, sending shivers down Masumi's spine yet again with how similar she sounded to Wendy. "Didn't you hear me the first time, boy?" she sneered. "There's more than one way to get close to someone. 'Body, mind, or soul', I believe were my exact words—and Masumi here has shared with me what she never could with any of you. Mine's not an especially quick method, I'll grant you—but the Duelist hasn't been born that can break free from my grasp."

"You did not answer his question," Shen said—far from angry, but his voice was raised, and there was a glint to his gaze that Masumi had never seen before. "What manner of danger were you—"

He broke off here—the ground had suddenly started to rumble. For a moment, Masumi thought of the Nephilim of last night's dream, and instantly braced herself for the worst. But after only a few seconds, the rumbling had passed as quickly as it had come, though Masumi could not tell whether the shaking in her legs was from the ground, or from her own fear.

Dr. Grimm had noticed. "Did you feel that—the earthquake?" she inquired. "That isn't you dreaming, Masumi ... that's the ambulance rushing you all to hospital."

Masumi's heart stopped. What did she just say?!

"Oh, yes—I would imagine that by now, the parents of that boy over there"—here, Dr. Grimm gestured carelessly to Fuyu, who recoiled—"have discovered five little children lying sound asleep on the floor of their planetarium. But those five little children are no longer sound asleep—their breathing has stopped, you see, along with a number of their brain functions. Right now, those five little children are fighting for their very lives … and the hound-mistress that's holding their chain doesn't even know it."

The Fusion user was rooted to the asphalt, stunned. She wasn't breathing at all—no, she realized deep down … her body wasn't breathing …

She knew from her health classes in school that this was the first step in a chain reaction that, if left unchecked, would spread throughout every system of her body … until her heart had stopped beating. Then came her lungs … her brain … cardiac arrest would set in … followed by …

Masumi felt a sudden numbness creeping over her body as she realized that the five Duelists alongside her had only minutes to live.

You will either win, Ito's voice whispered mockingly in her mind, or you will die …

She bit her lip for a few dangerously long seconds. No, she thought resolutely, curling her hands into fists until the blood flowed from her nails, as they bit into her skin. I'm not going to die!

Not tonight!

Then, before Dr. Grimm or anyone else could stop her, the Fusion Duelist did the first thing that came to mind—and punched herself hard in the face.

Pain was often the first step of the bridge that led from the dream world to the real world. Masumi knew this all too well from her past dreams, and the violent way they had ended. In her mind, then, as Dr. Grimm told her the unthinkable, she knew there had to be a way out—hence, by inflicting pain on her dream self to wake up in the real world. If what Dr. Grimm was saying turned out to be true, and all five of them were being rushed to the emergency room—and most importantly, once Masumi woke up—she could then do the same to her friends, thus getting them out of danger before cardiac arrest could claim them all.

As she reflexively squeezed her eyes shut to ward off the worst of the pain that was spreading throughout her face, numbing her lips and cheeks, she thought she'd come up with another good plan on the spur of the moment.

Except.

"Very clever, Masumi," Dr. Grimm's voice echoed in her ringing ears. "But tell me: after waking up inside of an ambulance—which, I would like to remind you, required you to do something I explicitly told you no Duelist ever has—what exactly were you planning on doing after that?"

Masumi's eyes snapped open.

The pain rapidly slid away from her face as she beheld the same twisted imagery of the dream world. Nothing had changed: the walls were still slathered in graffiti, the city was still ruined, the skies were still twisting with glowing cloud-strings—and most notably, four other young Duelists, and the echo of a fifth, were staring at her as though she'd suddenly gone mad. For all Masumi knew, that might well be the case.

But one way or the other, this was a problem.

"What's going on?" Masumi heard herself whisper. "I should be awake by now! Why am I still dreaming? Why am I still here?!"

"Ugh—I really do dislike having to explain myself more than once," huffed Dr. Grimm, who had up until now watching the scene with detached pleasure. "I've added on so much to this dream that it's no longer your dream. It hasn't been your dream for a very, very long time, Masumi. For all intents and purposes, you're in my world now—so if you don't mind, I'd like to explain what's going to happen to you from here on out."

Her dead green eyes flashed. "My psychic powers are able to induce a catatonic state on any Duelist I wish," she explained, "Thus neutralized, they are sent to this dream world, and forced to battle me. It's the perfect battleground for my powers for two reasons—firstly, it's the one place where those rather bothersome scanners I know your Leo Corporation possesses can't detect any Fusion Summoning energy that might otherwise give me away."

Scanners to detect Summoning energy?! Masumi's head was spinning now.

"Second, and more importantly," Dr. Grimm continued, "until this Duel has concluded, there's no way out for anyone I battle in this place—and with each passing Duel, their bodies and minds will weaken, becoming more susceptible to my powers with each loss they suffer.

"In essence, Masumi," smirked the puppet, "I used your emotional connection to Wendy Grimm as a way to extend my psychic influence over your friends. As soon as you fell asleep with them tonight, they became connected to me through you … which means these children are all dreaming the same dream we've been sharing for nights on end."

Masumi could barely breathe. How was it even possible for more than one person to have the same dream—and at the same time, no less?! Even if Dr. Grimm's claims of psychic powers made it possible, the level of concentration required for a collective dream of this scale—of this complexity—boggled her mind.

"And as Masumi knows full well," Dr. Grimm continued, speaking to the others, "she has already lost to me three times. If she loses to me tonight—if her Life Points hit zero before mine—you and your friends will be beyond all hope of saving. Your minds will be trapped in this world forever. None of you will ever wake up again."

The Fusion Duelist felt only a brief jolt to her insides as Dr. Grimm's words sank in—her downward spiral into despair was already terminal; this latest blow only intensified an already rapid fall. She'd led four innocent children to almost certain death—three of whom hardly even knew her a day.

Of course, nothing was ever certain in a dream … but what could Masumi do, when even her dreams were no longer hers to control?

"I did tell you, Masumi, the last night we met," Dr. Grimm leered at her, "that if you did not win this Duel, then you would die. If you still don't believe I'm telling the truth … well, the truth is all around you … "

She spread her arms outward. Masumi looked around her—and saw, quite clearly, the twisted truth of Dr. Grimm:

ÆMÆTH ÆMÆTH ÆMÆTH ÆMÆTH ÆMÆTH ÆMÆTH ÆMÆTH ÆMÆTH ÆMÆTH

The heavily vandalized walls of the alleyway, inches thick with how many times it must have been painted and repainted over and over again, no longer bore a thousand indistinct tags and unknown messages, but the same, single, unmistakable Word, repeated over and over for thousands of times and thousands of miles, plastered on every inch of space Masumi could see. It was everywhere, all around her—she could not see any surface around her, above her, or even beneath her, without that infernal Word. Even when she closed her eyes in a final attempt to deny what she already knew, she saw the echoes of the Word dance in her eyes, silently taunting her,

This is not a dream.

This is not a nightmare.

This is the last thing you will see before you die.

Yaiba saw the sight, too; all the color had long since drained from his face. "Okay—I was wrong about before," he said quite calmly, in spite of looking white as a sheet. "Now we're in trouble."

The Fusion Duelist didn't even hear him. She was slowly turning to her left in impotent horror, turning to look at the three Duelists she'd befriended today. Each of them was staring back at her with looks of confused helplessness—or was it betrayed hopelessness? Whatever it was they were feeling, Masumi could not blame them—but neither could she pretend that no one here felt more helpless or confused than she did—nor more betrayed and hopeless than she did.

For she knew there was no one to blame here but herself. In that brief moment of clarity this morning—how long ago it felt now, like some bygone age of history that Masumi had witnessed only as a babe!—she'd decided to recruit as many Duelists as she could, using her memories of their Duels, their cards, and their strategies to devise a plan that would defeat the menace in her mind once and for all. Masumi, however, now knew she'd vastly underestimated that menace—more than that, though, she'd failed to consider the possibility that it held more power over her than she would ever have dreamed was possible ... or how close to her the source of this menace had been all along.

But most of all, as she witnessed the anguished looks on the faces of her friends, both new and old, she knew she'd failed them.

It was Wendy, a stunned part of her was still saying through it all ... a lone voice of reason in the mental typhoon that raged inside her. Wendy—Dr. Grimm—had manipulated her from the beginning—that much she knew now. She'd used their time together as a weapon against Masumi, spreading her poisonous influence through her mind to theirs, trapping them all like flies in in a spiderweb. How was she supposed to consider that something so outlandish—psychic powers, collective dreaming, to say nothing of the mortal danger they were in—would actually turn out to be true?!

No matter how much she debated with herself, however, Masumi was beginning to realize she'd provided all the ammunition the puppet needed for that weapon.

I'm so sorry, she silently spoke to the Duelists, meeting their gazes with what felt like one of the most pitiable expressions she'd ever worn in her life. I didn't know … I never knew …

She had never felt so powerless … and yet, at the same time, Masumi knew somehow that things were only going to get worse.

In another world, a phone rang, shattering the silence of the night.

Masumi's father grumbled as he ripped off the covers—and grumbled louder still upon the realization that it was a quarter past midnight. If he'd been awake enough to the unfamiliar number that was calling him, he might have screened the call, and let it go to his voicemail. As it was, though, he was annoyed at having been woken up so suddenly; therefore, he was intent on giving this unknown caller a rare piece of his mind, rudeness be damned.

He answered the phone. "Who is this?" he demanded. "Why are you calling me at an hour like this?"

Ten words later, he got his answer—and suddenly, he was wide awake, his heart thudding at his breast. In a split second, the world had been turned upside down; all thought of sleep was now forgotten.

He had no memory of sprinting out of bed, or of getting dressed—nor did he recall dashing out of the house and into his car. All that was on his mind as he gunned the engine, speeding out of the driveway with the reckless abandon of a father determined to protect his family—his phone practically glued to his ear the whole way as he continued to speak frantically to the woman on the line—was the static-laced fear of the first ten words she'd spoken to him:

Masumi's with me—she's in an ambulance—she isn't breathing!

"So, then," Dr. Grimm grinned, as though she hadn't just unloaded an entire megaton of bombshells upon Masumi, "shall we continue? We are still in the middle of a Duel, after all, and none of you appear to have died yet. Time has no meaning inside of a dream, you know; the few minutes your physical forms have left to live can drag on for hours … or, they can fly by in a matter of seconds."

"So what's stopping you?" Yaiba demanded. "If you were planning on killing us all along, why haven't you?"

"A very good question." The smile remained eerily fixed upon the puppet's face. "For one thing, I'm not a psychic, only a psychic Duelist. The full extent of my powers is fully reliant upon my Dueling. Simply put, even though all of you are flirting with death's door as we speak, none of you can actually die until I am victorious tonight. I did tell you, remember, that there's no way out of this dream. As far as my powers are concerned, even death is just another means of escape." Her eyes narrowed. "And I don't intend for any one of you to escape me tonight."

A means of escape … The sheer nonchalance with which Dr. Grimm had spoken that simple phrase scared Masumi more than anything. She was toying with them all, she realized—the puppet had become the puppeteer. Dr. Grimm was going to make her puppets dance tonight, whether they wanted to or not—before throwing them all into the fire.

"More importantly, however," Dr. Grimm went on, "I don't plan on killing anyone at all tonight, if all goes well. All of you are such powerful Duelists—some more so than others, but that's easily remedied," she added, as her eyes flicked to Hokuto and Fuyu, dislike etched on every square inch of her face, "Killing any one of you would be a waste of resources. And if there's one thing the Professor doesn't like, it's wasted resources."

Through the darkness of the pit she continued to tumble into, Masumi understood. As long as they were all here, ensnared by Dr. Grimm's power, locked into this Duel, that was all she needed. They were all where she wanted them to be—why, Masumi did not yet understand, but there had to be a reason.

For now, however, there was no other option she could see.

"I hate to say it … but we ought to keep on Dueling," she muttered to Yaiba. "The longer we can, the longer we can survive—and the more we can learn about who and what she is. If we're lucky … " she can tell us all about that herself, she added mentally. There was no need for Dr. Grimm to hear that.

Yaiba bit his lip, but eventually nodded. He had the look of a condemned man, resigned to his final fate. Masumi shivered briefly at the notion that she was seeing that look on a teenager.

The Synchro Duelist took a shuddering breath, and drew. "My turn!"

Yaiba studied the card only briefly before slapping it upon his blade. "I Summon XX-Saber Ragigura in Defense Position!" he said. Moments later, a small chameleon in a scarlet cloak and dark gray armor sailed forth (Level 1: ATK 200 » 0/DEF 1000), crossing X-shaped blades and hissing threateningly at the two Fusion Monsters opposite.

Masumi grimaced at the weak monster. Yaiba was already being forced into a defensive position; without his Gatmuz to guard his Life Points, she guessed he was feeling vulnerable enough that Summoning any monster at all would do to keep him in this Duel.

"Whenever Ragigura is Normal or Special Summoned," Yaiba was saying, "I can add an X-Saber monster from my Graveyard to my hand—so I'll return XX-Saber Faultroll!" Masumi saw the card in question ejected from his Duel Disk an instant before Yaiba swiped it up.

She frowned. Faultroll could only be Special Summoned by controlling 2 other X-Sabers, she knew—but Yaiba only had the one. What was more, he'd already used his Normal Summon on Ragigura. She could only assume he was posturing to make a move next turn, waiting to draw another monster and Summon Faultroll then.

"Remember," Dr. Grimm said, petting her draconic puppet-steed, "the effect of my Midrash won't allow you to Special Summon more than once per turn. If you're planning on doing that, I suggest you use that Summon wisely."

"And your Egrysta negates that Summon," said Yaiba impatiently. "Yeah, yeah—I know that already."

Suddenly, he grinned. "But I wonder what happens if I Special Summon more than one monster at the same time?"

Masumi saw Dr. Grimm pull herself back an inch or two, wondering what the puppet knew that she didn't—and then the Fusion user's eyes fell upon Yaiba's face-down card.

"Trap activate: Gatmuz's Emergency Orders!" howled the Synchro Duelist as he threw out his hand, revealing that card. "If there's an X-Saber monster on the field, I can target two more X-Sabers in the Graveyards, then Special Summon them both to my field! I target X-Saber Souza and XX-Saber Gatmuz!"

Masumi's mouth fell open in delight as she realized what Yaiba was about to do. Somehow, he'd planned for the possibility that Dr. Grimm would have destroyed both of those Synchro Monsters, just as she'd done with that Special Hurricane card only a few turns previously. By Summoning those two monsters, he could then be free to attack with the two strongest monsters he possessed! The best part was that if she understood the effects of those Shaddoll Fusion Monsters right, this counted as only one Special Summon, so it could bypass Midrash's effect—yet Dr. Grimm would still have to choose between destroying Souza or Gatmuz with Egrysta's effect!

Gatmuz was the obvious choice, as its 3100 ATK—2400, with all those damned counters on Dr. Grimm's Field Spell—was enough to at least destroy Midrash, thereby allowing Yaiba to Special Summon Faultroll for even more field presence. But destroying that would leave Souza on the field—and Souza, Masumi knew, had the option to Tribute another X-Saber every turn (for instance, that Ragigura he'd just Summoned) so that when it battled, Souza could destroy the opposing monster, whether or not it was actually strong enough to do so on its own!

She felt elated—for the first time since learning the true stakes of this Duel, Masumi felt as though they could win.

And then—damnably—Dr. Grimm opened her mouth.

"Is that all you were going to do?" the puppet said disdainfully. "No more chains, no more effects? Honestly, I was expecting more from the likes of someone as strong as you."

"I don't need any more effects to take you down!" Yaiba shot back, as two massive portals opened either side of him. "Now come out, my monsters! Ready your blades, and—"

"El Shaddoll Egrysta's effect!" interrupted Dr. Grimm. "Once per turn, if I have a Shaddoll monster in my hand, I can negate your Special Summon!"

"Well, then, you've got yourself a choice to make!" Yaiba laughed at her. "Maybe it's only one Special Summon, but I'm Special Summoning more than one monster here! So make a choice—which one gets destroyed, and which one destroys your monster?"

Dr. Grimm snorted. "There is no 'which'," she said. "Since you've just as good as told me none of your monsters start any chains when they're Summoned, I don't need to make any choice at all—El Shaddoll Egrysta can negate the Summon of your monsters and destroy them both!"

"What?!" Masumi and Yaiba shouted in perfect unison. Both Duelists watched as the portals behind Yaiba shrank to twin points of light before winking out entirely. Masumi could have sworn both Synchro Monsters had been an instant away from leaping out of them.

Damn it, she swore. Yet again, those blasted Shaddolls had singlehandedly wrecked what would have been a winning strategy. Worst of all, Masumi knew that this time, it had only happened because neither of them had fully understood Egrysta's effect—either that, or they had a lot to learn about the subtler rules of Duel Monsters that Dr. Grimm seemed to know.

Powerful Duel Monsters with even more powerful effects … add to it, an understanding of the game that eclipsed even the top three students in LDS … all in all, Masumi had never remembered having to face such a formidable Duelist in her life—and she was including Hiiragi Yuzu.

"Pitiful." Dr. Grimm snorted again. "If you're the best that LDS has to offer, then your Lancers stand even less of a chance than I thought—and I never had that high of an opinion of them in the first place.

"Now, then," she continued before Masumi could interject. "Since I used Egrysta's effect, I now send a Shaddoll monster from my hand to the Graveyard—and that monster just so happens to be one Shaddoll Snake," the puppet smirked as she slotted the card into her Graveyard. "And when this Snake is sent to my Graveyard by a card effect, its effect lets me return it back to my hand once every turn, if I have another Shaddoll monster in my Graveyard!"

Masumi watched as the card Dr. Grimm had slipped in her Graveyard bare moments ago was just as suddenly spat back out into her hand. Already she'd realized what that card was capable of, and it didn't make things any easier.

"Oh, yes." Dr. Grimm was staring at Masumi so intently that the Fusion Duelist doubted there was any need for her to read her mind. "As long as I have this card in my hand, and these monsters on my field, I can prevent you from Special Summoning at all, for as long as I wish. And don't forget about my Field Spell, either," she added, pointing at the ground, where Masumi was just able to notice an eighth shadow beginning to spread outward from Yaiba's Ragigura. "One more counter, one more sliver of ATK whittled away from your monsters … slowly but surely, until there's nothing left for you to attack with."

"She's as good as invincible," Yaiba murmured from beside her as he slipped a card into his Duel Disk, looking totally lost at how easily his Summons had been negated. "One card face-down, and I end my turn."

He sighed. "Hokuto, I really hope you've got a way to deal with this, or we're sunk."

The Xyz user didn't look too convinced by the card he'd just drawn. "It'll have to do for now," he said grimly. "I Summon Sacred Pollux in Attack Position!" A burly knight emerged next to him, the whole left side of its armored form covered in pure, polished white (Level 4: ATK 1700 » 900/DEF 600).

"During the turn Pollux is Normal Summoned," Hokuto said, "I can Normal Summon another Sacred monster this turn! So I'll Release Pollux to Advance Summon Sacred Antares in Defense Position!" Pollux disintegrated mere moments later; then, its remains rapidly reformed into a larger, more slender figure with a scorpion-like rope dart in its hands, and a glare in its eyes that did not diminish even as the Field of the Duel took effect upon its body (Level 6: ATK 2400 » 1600/DEF 600).

"Because Antares was Normal Summoned, I can activate its effect," explained Hokuto, "and return a Sacred monster in my Graveyard back to my hand! I choose to return Sacred Giedi!"

As Hokuto retrieved his chosen card, Masumi felt a sudden, if miniscule, surge of hope. Hokuto hadn't bothered to use any opportunity to Special Summon any monsters. That meant Dr. Grimm's Egrysta had no monsters on which activate its effect, and with it, no Shaddolls to send to the Graveyard, which in turn meant that everyone's monsters were essentially a hundred points higher than they might have been otherwise. It was a miniscule amount of hope, but it was still hope all the same—and Masumi was very fervently hoping that those hundred points would prove the difference between victory and defeat.

Especially since Antares was Level 6—and had just returned a Level 4 monster to Hokuto's hand that could increase the Level of any monster on the field by up to 2. If all went well, Masumi knew, he could bring his ace monster out on his next turn—but that was assuming Dr. Grimm gave any of them the chance to see it.

"I end my turn with that," Hokuto said. "Hotene, you're up now. It's up to you to swing this in our favor."

The tiny Duelist looked much the worse for wear. Hotene's curly hair had wilted completely; there was none of the cheer to be found on her round face and wide mouth. Masumi cursed Dr. Grimm again for consigning the young girl to such a terrible fate—though the knowledge that she had unwittingly aided the Psychic Duelist in the deed made the curse a very hollow one indeed.

Hotene swallowed, took a deep breath, and drew. "My turn!"

Masumi remembered from their Duel this afternoon that Hotene's lack of poker face was a weakness—her young age and ability to find excitement in almost anything she saw could be turned against her whenever she drew a good card. Whether Hotene had learned to correct that shortcoming, or whether she'd drawn a mediocre card just now, Masumi did not know—but the look on the little girl's face was unchanged either way, and that didn't bode well.

"First, I'll switch my Tamed Spirit Beast Petolphin to Defense Position," Hotene said. Masumi noted how much flatter her voice sounded as Petolphin shifted into a defensive stance. It lacked Hotene's usual enthusiasm; she sounded as though she was one push away from losing her nerve completely.

"An' then," Hotene went on, "I'll Summon Noble Spirit Beast Apelio in Attack Position." She swiped a card on her blade; moments later, a dark red-furred cub with blazing mane and paws leapt onto the field (Level 4: ATK 1800 » 1000/DEF 200).

"Now … I'll banish my Noble Spirit Beast Kannahawk an' my Spirit Beast Tamer Elder!" she declared.

Huh?! Masumi whirled upon Hotene with the rotational speed of a tornado. "What are you doing?!" she shouted, panicking, knowing any minute that Dr. Grimm would activate that nasty effect again. But it was too late to chastise Hotene for her blunder; her two monsters were already reaching for one another—and touching for only the briefest of moments.

"Contact Fusion!" chanted the tiny Duelist. "Appear! Tamed Spirit Beast Kannahawk!"

The Fusion Duelist stood wild-eyed at the sight of the lightning-wreathed bird, rider and all, descending from the skies yet again (Level 6: ATK 1400 » 600/DEF 1600), alighting alongside Petolphin. It didn't look nearly so threatening with its ATK strength as low as it was, but the fact that Hotene had Summoned it in Defense Position made Masumi aware that Hotene had done this to further protect her Life Points.

That wasn't, however, why Masumi was so surprised—her eyes had flown to Dr. Grimm, who wasn't moving at all. She never activated Egrysta's effect, she realized. Why, though—is there something about that Shaddoll Snake she didn't tell us about? Maybe she's saving it for something worse … or …

Her gaze suddenly focused on Dr. Grimm's dead green eyes. Masumi was quick to note the dark flames within them—how they blazed with malicious intent. Below that, however, was a smile that Masumi had seen once before, but never would have expected to see again on the face of this puppet—it was a smile of pure, innocent joy.

For some reason—though Masumi could not fathom why—seeing this monster made Dr. Grimm happy.

Either way, she was not about to look this gift horse in the mouth—the puppet's failure to activate her monster's effect might ultimately decide this Duel. Masumi hoped she was right.

Hotene, meanwhile, seemed to agree with her sentiment—and the fact that Kannahawk's Summon hadn't been negated seemed to have cheered her up somewhat. "I activate my Tamed Kannahawk's effect," she said, raising her voice, "an' return two of my banished monsters to my Graveyard! I return my Elder an' my Noble Kannahawk!" She ejected two cards from her Duel Disk, placing them in a different compartment. "Then, I can add a Spirit Beast card from my Deck to my hand!" A third card jutted outwards from her Deck, snatched up by her stubby fingers.

"I Set one card, an' end my turn," she finished, looking much more confident than when her turn had started. "How am I doin', Masu-chan?" she called out.

Masumi brought herself back to reality just in time to hear the pleading note in Hotene's question, and knew that even though the little girl sounded much better, she still needed a lot more confidence to survive this Duel.

She flashed a thumbs-up. "You're doing great, Hotene!" she replied back, biting back her rebukes of how cocky the little girl had acted during her turn. "Hang in there, and you'll do just fine!"

Even as she said the words, however, Masumi felt the pit in her stomach grow deeper still. Her eyes hadn't wavered from Dr. Grimm except to look at Hotene. There was something in that puppet's eyes that she didn't like one bit—especially since they were staring intently at another Fusion Duelist right now.

If Dr. Grimm hadn't looked so overjoyed to see Hotene's Fusion Summoning, Masumi would have thought that the little girl would be Dr. Grimm's first target. But the puppet had proved herself a frighteningly clever Duelist—someone of her caliber would obviously know that the most inviting target was someone without any hand or field to defend herself … someone like Masumi.

And yet … Masumi could not shake herself of the way Dr. Grimm was eyeing Hotene. Something about it was just … wrong. She could see the shadowy flames in those eyes, even from here—and they stank of covetous greed. Had Dr. Grimm wanted Hotene to bring out her Tamed Kannahawk, then? Was the thrill of watching such a rare form of Fusion Summoning the sole reason why she'd put aside using Egrysta's effect this turn?

For now, though, she needed to put these thoughts aside; Shen was beginning his turn, and drawing his card.

If anyone in this Duel was in as bad a way as Masumi was, she though, it was Shen. He had no cards in his hand—worse still, all he had to his field was a Spell, a Trap, and a monster apiece. Neither of these did much to help him, unless he'd just drawn another monster. Even this, though, would be little comfort as well; Masumi had a feeling that not even Shen's Synchro Monsters had the brute strength to take out Dr. Grimm's Fusion Monsters at this point.

"I will Set one card," Shen said calmly, watching the holographic card digitize at his feet, "and I will end my turn with that."

Masumi grimaced. Shen had been having a really rough time of things in this Duel, even if he was mature enough not to let it show. Having to Set a card simply because there was nothing else in his hand was not a situation most Duelists wanted to be in.

That said, he looked quite unperturbed—even accepting of the situation he'd been forced into, which surprised her. Most people of Shen's age—indeed, even some who were older and wiser, would be flat-out terrified if they were in his place. She wondered if the Synchro user trusted Masumi that wholeheartedly to get him out of this jam.

Rokkaku Fuyu, meanwhile, looked almost as woebegone as Hotene had when she'd begun her turn. His eyes had refused to waver from the two Fusion Monsters Dr. Grimm controlled, even as he drew his card. Sweat ran down his face, matting the bangs that covered his left eye, and his hands were shaking so violently they appeared blurred.

"C'mon, Fuyu," Masumi urged him. "We're all here with you. We'll get us all through this together."

"She's right," Hokuto added. Both Fuyu and Masumi whirled on him, each as equally surprised as the other. "She's got us this far. If she still believes we can win—well, I'm ready to believe her, too."

Masumi could have kissed the Xyz Duelist if he wasn't a figment of her imagination. The glowing words had even more of an effect on Fuyu; though he was still sweating bullets, his hands were no longer trembling—and when he spoke, he sounded much more sure of himself than he'd been just a minute ago.

"I activate the Continuous Trap: Celestial Aura!" he said, revealing the card he'd Set last turn. "Once per turn, during my Main Phase or your Battle Phase," he spoke to Dr. Grimm, "I can Special Summon a tellarknight monster from my hand! I choose to Summon Satellarknight Sirius!"

The familiar form of the bluish-gray warrior burst forth from Celestial Aura's digital doppelgänger and next to Fuyu's Unuk, doglike helm glinting in the alien light from the threads above (Level 4: ATK 1600 » 800/DEF 900). Masumi's eyes quickly flicked to Dr. Grimm, expecting her to use her Egrysta's effect once again—but once more, just like with Hotene, Dr. Grimm remained where she was.

The sneer on her face, however, was visible even from here. "That's it?" she sniffed, looking down in disapproval at the new Summon. "You're not worth wasting a card on, if that's all you're able to Special Summon."

"That's where you're wrong," Fuyu said—incredibly, he was smiling despite the tense Duel. "Once per turn, if Sirius is Summoned, I can target five tellarknights in my Graveyard, and shuffle them all into my Deck!"

Masumi arched her eyebrows as the Xyz Duelist swiped a number of cards out of his Duel Disk and back into his Deck—Fuyu was recycling all the monsters that had been sent to the Graveyard along with Deltatheros after Special Hurricane had destroyed it. Better yet, if she was counting right, Deltatheros was one of the five monsters that he was going to recycle—so it would be sent to the Extra Deck instead, meaning Fuyu would have a chance to Xyz Summon it again, and perhaps make better use of its effects this time.

"Finally, I can draw a card," said Fuyu as he did precisely this, "and I'll Summon it in Defense Position! Come out, Satellarknight Sham!" A small figure—almost a child in comparison to Unuk and Sirius —stepped out of nowhere between the two warriors, brandishing a golden bow in its gloved hands (Level 4: ATK 1400 » 600/DEF 1800).

"Once per turn, when Sham is Summoned," Fuyu continued, "I can inflict 1000 damage to my opponent!"

Masumi whooped in glee, not even bothering to suppress it—she didn't care if it was only a thousand points of damage; at this point, every little bit helped.

Sham, meanwhile, had nocked an arrow on its bow, and fired it upwards a moment later—straight for Dr. Grimm. The missile flew straight and true, streaking past the neck of Midrash and piercing the breast of the marionette that commanded it. There was a shriek of pain, followed swiftly by a small explosion. When the dust cleared, the Psychic Duelist's LP gauge was seen to sit at 23000—still a ludicrous amount, but anything that damaged a foe this dangerous was a morale boost for Masumi. She felt like she could kiss Fuyu this time, no matter how far apart the two Duelists were right now.

Dr. Grimm, meanwhile, ripped the arrow out from the cracked hole it had left in her hollow chest as Fuyu Set a card to end his turn. The smile had faded from the puppet's face completely, creasing into a snarl of combined pain and rage—and those dead eyes were blazing more ferociously than ever.

"All right," she said softly, almost half to herself, as she forcefully drew her next card. "Now I'm mad."

Her gaze swiveled to the card in her hand for only an instant—but in that instant, Masumi had seen the way the fire in her eyes had danced upon seeing it. She knew, instinctively, that things were about to get very serious, very fast.

"Since I control two or more Fusion Monsters," Dr. Grimm said coldly, "I can activate the Trap Card: Skill Fusion from my hand!"

Masumi recoiled. She activated a Trap Card without even Setting it first?!

"This card lets me fuse monsters from the field or my hand for a Fusion Summon!" Dr. Grimm said, speaking more loudly than before. "I choose to fuse—"

"Not this time!" screamed Fuyu as he revealed the card he'd Set just last turn. "Counter Trap: Celestial Factor! By sending a tellarknight on my field to the Graveyard, I negate the activation of your Trap and destroy it!"

Masumi pumped her fist. That was the third time the Xyz Duelist had managed to impress her in this Duel. Hokuto, meanwhile, was standing with his jaw slightly askew—as if even he himself hadn't been expecting this level of play from a Duelist he'd won entire tag-team tournaments alongside.

"I send my Satellarknight Unuk to the Graveyard to negate and destroy your Skill Fusion," Fuyu cried, "and then, I can draw a card!" He did so at the same moment the slender warrior in front of him was vaporized, and Dr. Grimm slid her card into a slot in her Duel Disk.

But just as suddenly, the hideous smile was back on the puppet's face. "If you think destroying my cards is all you need to defeat me," she hissed, "you've got another thing coming.

"I activate the other effect of Skill Fusion!" she howled. "By banishing this card from my Graveyard, I can banish monsters from the field or my Graveyard for a Fusion Summon!"

Masumi's jaw dropped. Just how many cards does this psycho's Deck have to let her Fusion Summon?!

"I banish one of my Shaddoll Hedgehogs from my Graveyard—and then I'll activate the effect of my Cursed Shadow's Snare!" Dr. Grimm went on. "I can remove three counters from the Field to use one of your monsters for my other Fusion Material!"

Uh-oh. Masumi and her friends traded looks of unease. Somehow, she knew what was coming next—and it was worrying her more than ever, because it was a monster she still knew nothing about.

Dr. Grimm, meanwhile, had focused all her attention on Fuyu. "I'm a firm believer in quid pro quo," she snarled at the Xyz Duelist. "Since you had the guts to damage me with your monster, I think it's only fair I do the same to you! So I'll use that Sham of yours as my other Fusion Material—and Summon the strongest monster in my Deck!"

She threw out her jointed hand at Sham; as if on cue, the squirming shadows that surrounded the form of Fuyu's monster snaked up its armor without resistance. Before the young warrior could even think to fight back, the translucent black tendrils had ensnared it completely, dragging it down into the same bottomless pit that had devoured Masumi's own Gem-Knight Master Dia just last night—

"Dark threads of the otherworld, bind the light to your will! FUSION SUMMON!"

Masumi felt her stomach contract as Dr. Grimm's chanting reached her ears. She knew what was coming—and it took every bit of effort she had to not lose all hope right now. She had remembered the first time she saw that monster—how just by seeing it, the sheer hopelessness of the situation had almost suffocated her.

She knew she wasn't going to face it alone this time—but would that even make a difference?

High above the Duel, meanwhile, the violet threads of the sky began to move, undulating and unraveling to form thousands upon thousands of smaller threads. They wriggled in the air for a moment, like supernatural serpents, before rushing towards a single point in the sky directly above them—

"Blind the foolish eyes with the brilliance of God!" the Psychic Duelist shrieked. "Rise now, El Shaddoll Nephilim!"

This time, Masumi was ready for the flash of light that came from the threads connecting in midair, shielding her eyes with the crook of her elbow, steeling her legs so as to keep from falling over.

There was no preparing herself, however, for the awesome size of the Duel Monster she had seen once before. She lowered her arm, and instantly felt her legs begin to tremble as the gargantuan marionette slowly—almost regally—descended from the heavens, thousands of threads sprouting from her back like gigantic wings. The vast face of the miles-high puppet shone with all the radiance of an angel … but none of the mercy.

Masumi saw the point gauge of the terrible, beautiful monster for the first time (Level 8: ATK 2800/DEF 2500), and grimaced as she realized that there was nothing in any of their Decks that could touch this creature right now. Only the strongest of her Gem-Knights had the raw power to deal with that much ATK as long as Dr. Grimm's field was in play—and the odds of her successfully bringing one of those out on her next turn were very slim indeed.

Around her, shocked mutters were sputtering all around her, like a storm over a rising sea. "That thing is huge … " Masumi heard Yaiba murmur. Shen had bitten his lip till the blood flowed—yet another rare display of emotion. Words had completely failed Hotene and Fuyu; both Duelists were rooted to the ground, petrified.

"Masumi," Hokuto remarked, his voice softer than she'd ever heard it, "I hope you've got a way to deal with this."

The Fusion user had no reply.

"Nephilim's effect activates when it's Special Summoned," said Dr. Grimm, "and lets me send a Shaddoll monster from my Deck to the Graveyard! I send a second Shaddoll Beast—then activate its effect to let me draw a card!"

Two swiped cards later: "And now," the Psychic Duelist hissed, "Trap Card, open: Shadow of Fusion!"

Masumi took a few steps back as Dr. Grimm revealed her Set card—not from the act itself, but from how forcefully she'd done it. The puppet was practically frothing at the mouth; she looked and sounded completely demented.

"During the turn I activate this card," Dr. Grimm smirked, "I can turn any attacks I make with Fusion Monsters into direct attacks!"

Total pandemonium erupted among the six Duelists; each of them knew full well that Dr. Grimm had three Fusion Monsters on her field, with a combined strength of over 6000 ATK. Masumi felt that deep dark pit in her chest widen just a little more as she realized that the Psychic Duelist had been toying with them yet again.

The Fusion Duelist stood there—without a hand, without a field, without any defenses at all—knowing that she was about to lose once again … and this time, she wouldn't be losing just this Duel.

"Battle Phase!" Dr. Grimm screamed. "El Shaddoll Midrash! El Shaddoll Egrysta!"

Masumi closed her eyes and bowed her head, helplessly resigned to the worst—it was all over—

"—attack Menoko Hotene directly!"

What?!

Masumi's head whipped upwards so quickly that her neck cricked—and her snapped her eyes open just in time to see Egrysta's flaming fists unleash twin torrents of crimson fire at the precise moment that the jaws of Midrash vomited a deluge of violet energy—all of it headed straight for Hotene.

"Blazing Shadowflame!"

The tiny Duelist didn't have a prayer. The fiery flood of the twin attacks engulfed her before she could even think to shield herself. Masumi heard a piercing scream for only a split second before the roar of the blast drowned even that out.

So appalled was she by the spectacle that Masumi felt short of breath, and thus realized she'd forgotten to breathe. Her heart was beating a deafening tattoo against her breast as she watched the fires fade away, revealing a crater the size of a car within the vandalized walls of the alley.

Hotene laid dead center in that crater, splay-legged and unconscious, bleeding from a dozen wounds. Her Duel Disk continued to emit a high-pitched squeal as final as any death knell, her LP gauge having long since plunged to zero.

It felt like hours before a shell-shocked Masumi found her voice. "Hotene, no!"

She rushed towards the defeated Duelist, desperate to find out if she was still alive—but she only got three paces. All of a sudden, Masumi felt her joints lock up in mid-step, freezing her body, preventing her from moving a muscle. Confounded, she shifted her eyes downward—the only part of her body she could move—and was shocked to see a number of purple threads extending from her body, somewhere up and off to her right.

Masumi didn't even have to shift her gaze to know the source of those threads; a moment later, those threads had shifted, and she had a brief view of Dr. Grimm standing there with her right hand outstretched—before feeling a jerking sensation somewhere in the base of her spine. She yelped as her body was pulled back with it, skidding against the asphalt some twenty feet, tearing her clothes, leaving scrapes and bruises all over her skin.

Dr. Grimm, meanwhile, had dismounted from Midrash, and was crossing the distance between her and Hotene with purpose in every one of her jointed steps. The threads that extended from her cone-like sleeve presently separated themselves from Masumi, writhing in midair like so many worms as Dr. Grimm continued on her way.

"Oh, don't you worry, Masumi." The Psychic Duelist spared Masumi only a brief, dispassionate glance, not even pausing in her step. "I'll make sure she gets all better—just you watch. I am a doctor, after all."

She laughed; a soft, cold giggle that made Masumi's blood boil. "I pay 4000 Life Points to bring your friend to full strength," she said, barely even pausing for breath as she watched her LP gauge fall to 19000 with only a passing interest, "except … well, I'm afraid she won't be your friend for much longer."

The threads began to writhe more violently now, perhaps sensing the prey that now lay before their puppet-master. "Now, I believe this is the part where I offer you the opportunity to say some last words," sighed Dr. Grimm, "but I've learned from previous experience that there is truly nothing more tiresome than last-minute theatrics!"

Before Masumi could even cry out in protest, the outstretched right hand of the puppet twitched. In an instant, a full dozen of those threads had raced outwards from her sleeve and into the tiny Duelist's body, burrowing into her skin with no resistance whatsoever, glowing brighter than ever—

There was silence for a moment that passed by as slow as a millennium.

Then, Hotene pitched forward, and screamed.

Masumi felt her insides dissolve as she saw the threads infiltrate their way deeper into Hotene's body, worming into her arms and legs, squeezing her chest and constricting her neck, continuing to blaze with a fiery light that burned the Duelist from the inside out. The Fusion Duelist could smell smoke in the air; Hotene's lavender romper dress, ruined from the direct attack she had sustained only moments ago, was beginning to blacken at the edges—

"Stop it!" shrieked Masumi at the top of her lungs—pleading, begging for the puppet to end this inhumane torture. "Stop it, please—you're killing her!"

"Really now, is a doctor's word good for nothing these days?" scoffed Dr. Grimm. Her eyes flashed; the threads coming from her arms became just a little bit brighter. "I already told you I'm not going to kill her—but neither am I going to seal her."

The marionette smiled nastily. "I see potential in this one. I may even have to schedule future sessions with her."

Sessions? The single word was like a light bulb flicking on in Masumi's brain. So that was why Dr. Grimm hadn't negated the Summon of Hotene's Tamed Kannahawk, she thought. That was why she'd been eyeing the tiny Duelist so greedily—and maybe even why she'd attacked her instead of Masumi: she'd wanted to witness her abilities of Contact Fusion … a rare and powerful method of Fusion Summoning that few Duelists in the world knew how to properly use—fewer still who were as young as Hotene.

She'd wanted it all for herself.

This then, must be the reason why she'd seen the face of the little girl in her dream last night, thought Masumi. Somehow, Dr. Grimm had anticipated she would try to seek Hotene out, along with Shen and Fuyu—and these, too, must have been lures, planted by the Psychic Duelist into Masumi's mind, waiting for the Fusion Duelist to form a plan to beat the nightmares that had haunted her so.

That plan had worked all too well, she now understood. Damn it, she swore. How could I have been so blind?!

Hotene, meanwhile, was now writhing about so badly that she'd managed to fall out of the crater in the wall. Rivulets of blood streamed from the hole she'd left behind. The light from the threads that continued to inflict unimaginable pain on her body cast shadows along the innumerable repetitions of ÆMÆTH that lined the alley.

And all the while, she continued to scream more loudly than Masumi had ever thought a human being could.

"Imagine, Masumi, if you will," breathed Dr. Grimm, somehow drowning out the tortured shrieks of her young captive despite the utter calm of her silken voice. "Imagine having the ability to cross the dimensions, and to know the secrets of your leaders with a single thought. Imagine … knowing how to command them—control them—with a mere sliver of your mind. Imagine your dimension coming to know ours, just as you have come to know me … because it's happening right now.

"Oh, yes," she purred, reveling in the dread Masumi was feeling. "We will be everywhere. We are everywhere. We walk among you even now, in body and mind—in your streets, in your own dreams … but neither will be yours for much longer. Because even as we speak, your world is being changed—one person at a time, one mind at a time, slowly but surely molded like clay, never once aware that they are being remade from the inside out."

The fire in the puppet's eyes reached a crescendo, and Hotene's cries of agony grew louder still, even as her throat turned raw. "That is my dream, Masumi," Dr. Grimm whispered. "It's a dream that will never, ever stop for as long as I live. I'm going to keep on dreaming forever, keep on Dueling forever—because as long as there are still young, healthy, shapeable minds to Duel and claim in the name of Academia … my dream will never die."

Masumi was trembling head to foot. Minds to Duel and claim ... she's talking about—

"'Life and death, come and go: marionettes in a puppet show,'" sang Dr. Grimm, oblivious to Masumi's sudden look of nauseated realization. "'If a single string should snap … tumble, tumble, down they go.'"

She waved her hand once, and at long last, the light of the strings died as they extracted themselves from Hotene's smoldering body. As if on cue, the tiny Duelist quickly ceased her screaming and thrashing about.

Too quickly, a corner of Masumi's mind thought—and Hotene was staying too silent for comfort. The little girl should have been coughing up a storm from how raw her throat must be right now. Smoke curled from her entire body, making it impossible to see whether she was alive or—no, Masumi thought, shaking her head, she can't be—

Dr. Grimm now knelt before the little girl, speaking in the softest, gentlest voice Masumi had ever heard her use, even when she'd known her as Wendy. If she closed her eyes, she could almost imagine sitting in one of those overstuffed armchairs, lying back in bliss as the aroma of chamomile-and-ginger tea wafted in from the kitchen.

"Get up, Hotene," Dr. Grimm said. The smile on the Psychic Duelist's face was eerily calm, completely at odds with the madwoman who'd just finished torturing a girl no older than ten. "Come on, then—up you go, darling."

Masumi felt her heart leap into her throat as tiny fingers twitched on the asphalt—but just as suddenly, her heart sank back into her chest, then well into her bowels; Hotene's body was moving—but not Hotene herself.

As she now saw, not all of the strings that had pierced the tiny Duelist's flesh had left her. Some of them continued to stream from her hands and feet—then one more from her neck that Masumi thought looked like just one more curly hair, standing on end as though some invisible hand was plucking it out. They arced high into the sky, lost to sight almost straightaway.

Some unknown force was now making those threads twitch, throbbing like the gossamer silk of a spider's web in the morning dew. Masumi's gaze now traveled downward, back to Hotene's body.

Her stomach turned over.

The smoke that had wreathed the broken body of the child prodigy had now been dispelled, revealing a nightmarish sight. Hotene was floating at eye level with the Duelists, frozen in a fetal position—suspended in midair by the same threads that had tortured her. Her purple romper dress had been repaired, the burns and tears erased as if they'd never existed at all—but the garment was far more starched and rigid—almost as though—

"There's a good girl." Dr. Grimm clapped her jointed hands together at the sight in joy—the joy of a mother watching her child walk for the first time. "Are you feeling better now, dear?"

Masumi felt sick as the figure before her uncurled into a standing position, revealing a pair of soulless blue eyes, tinged with bloody red, glowing in the dark alley like twin pits of blood. The face they were set into was pale and shiny, yet sunken and weathered; the curly blonde hair that framed it was no longer a tangled mess, but styled into an elaborate coiffure. It was no longer the face of a child, and yet it was—or at least, it once was.

But what held Masumi's attention most of all was not the face, but the limbs of the thing that had once been the top Junior Fusion user in LDS: an innocent girl who Dueled for the innocent pleasure of a smile … now little more than an extension of the cruel nightmare that had defeated her.

Jointed limbs flexed, stretching to their fullest extent. Weathered lip flaps creaked open—and dead, unblinking blue eyes shone with malevolent light.

"I … feel … " whispered the puppet of Menoko Hotene, "like … I … could … smile … "

A/N: Well, that got dark and convoluted in a hurry. Poor Hotene.

In case you weren't aware by now, Dr. Grimm's design was mostly based on the rider of El Shaddoll Midrash—with the tiniest dash of Camula from GX thrown in. When I was planning out her character, I thought about making her look more like Nephilim instead, but she came off as looking a bit too cold and aloof. I wanted Dr. Grimm's 'Wendy' persona to be someone that an anime protagonist could relate to in their time of need—and thus, all the more shocking to said protagonist when she inevitably revealed her true colors. Ultimately, that was why Midrash's design won out for me.

Next chapter's going to be a while coming out; I still haven't finished writing the Duel itself, so I may just use this time to blow the dust off Skyrim and start working on Rain's Hand again. I feel like I've been letting it sit for way, way too long, and I apologize to my readers for that. Tomorrow's a new year, though - and I intend to make it a productive one.

Thanks for reading! Have a happy 2016! - K