Silence. And in that silence, James.
"Rubbish!" he said indignantly, shattering the strained hush that had fallen over the group. "You expect us to believe that you're a bunch of gods who use our planet as a breeding ground for the Numbers?"
"A bunch of gods..." Gilag repeated, chuckling. "Yeah, I like that."
"Enough, Gilag," Durbe said sharply, and Gilag fell silence almost at once. "The Barian World has no gods," he added, addressing James. "It used to, but he is sealed away, and no longer welcome in our world. So no, we aren't gods... we're merely soldiers, doing everything we can to protect our world."
"By destroying another!" the Stranger said furiously. "Have you even stopped to consider the lives of all those in the other world?"
"Of course we have!" Alit snapped. "We're not heartless, you know!"
"We just have a greater view of what's important," Mizael added. "What's important is our family, our friends, our world. Not the denizens of some degenerate world of creatures that have barely learnt to crawl."
Professor Usur cleared his throat before the Stranger could speak again, and all eyes fell on him. As much as he tried to conceal it, he was still in a bad way – he was hunched over and clinging to the wall for support, his arms shaking slightly. When he spoke, his voice was slightly hoarse.
"As much as I'd love to stand here arguing ideals all day," he said loudly, "I think it's time we got on with business. I've kept my end of the bargain, Barians. The time has time to make good on your promises."
"I knew it!" Matt said suddenly, speaking to Durbe. "You were never working for Usur... he was working for you."
Durbe nodded, without turning around.
"Well... that's not strictly true," Usur said uncomfortably. "Neither of us was above the other in the relationship. We were business partners."
"Really?" Mizael said, his visible facial features creased in anger. "Because I recall that you rather enjoyed placing yourself above us, bossing us around like we were as worthless to you as your Team Beta and Delta."
"It's ok Professor," Alit added smugly. "If it makes you feel any better, you were worthless to us too."
Usur, stunned, said nothing for a moment. Then he shook his head. "It doesn't matter who was above who," he said. "All I care about now is getting what I've rightly earned. That was our agreement, Barians! You give me what I want in exchange for the Numbers."
"And what is it you want?" the Stranger asked suspiciously.
The Professor pointed a shaking finger at the Barian Lords. "That!" he said. "I want their power."
The Stranger looked at him utterly incredulously. "You... what?"
"What the hell are you on about?!" Skyler snapped.
"These guys were once humans," Usur went on, "but became the way they are due to radiation from the Barian World. As you can see, it didn't kill them, but rather gave them powers far beyond human comprehension. I want that same power! That was our agreement: I collect the Numbers for them, and in exchange, they turn me into a Barian!"
The Stranger stared at him a moment longer, then let out a deep sigh and massaged her forehead. "Usur, you fool..."
At almost the same time, Alit burst out in hysterical laughter.
"What's so funny?" Usur asked suspiciously.
"You... you actually bought it!" Alit guffawed. "All this time and you believed us!"
"What?"
"We were never humans, you cretin," Mizael growled. He actually sounded physically repulsed by the idea. "We were born and raised in the Barian World. We are aliens, through and through – we share nothing in common with a degenerate planet of monkeys like this one."
"That lie we fed you was to get you working for us," Gilag finished. "We can't make you a Barian anymore than you can make us enjoy hearing you speak! Lithon came closer to experiencing the power of the Barians than you ever did." The hulking man glanced over his shoulder to where Lithon was lying, seemingly oblivious to everything going on around him. "Now look at the state of him. Pathetic..."
With an expression of growing horror, and his hands shaking worse than ever, Usur looked at Durbe. "Is this true?" he asked in a hoarse whisper.
Durbe nodded once.
And in that instant, Usur's reality shattered. Everything he'd worked towards had been pointless – he would never get his perfect Barian body, never experience true power. He was doomed to be trapped inside his pitiful human body forever, forced to live with the knowledge that, out there, there were creatures like the Barians with powers that he could never attain. He was insignificant, pathetic, nothing... just like all the others. Seemingly losing the will to remain standing, he slid down the short wall and collapsed to his knees, breathing heavily.
"This has gone on long enough," Durbe said, turning away from the Professor and back to the rest of the group. "Deltas, Skyler, Lithon, Kodoku... this will be the last you see of us. We shall take the Numbers and return to our own world, where we will bring peace to the Barian World at last. Meanwhile, with the absence of the Numbers, your world will also regain normality, and you can live on in-"
"Not a chance..." Matt said quietly.
Durbe stopped mid-sentence. "What?"
"We're not just letting you slaughter an entire world because you value your people more," Katie replied.
"The people of the Kasen World are just as important as any other world," Dan nodded. "Why should they suffer to save your world? What makes them of lesser value?"
"Our world's in no danger from the Numbers while we're here," Leah added. "We have bands to protect ourselves, so we can just keep the Numbers for the rest of our lives to stop them ever harming anyone in our world again."
"What they said!" James said, loudly and proudly.
"You're not taking those Numbers," Matt said, "and that's final!" With that, he raised his arm to activate his duel disk. Around him, his teammates did likewise.
"You expect to stop us from taking the Numbers yourselves?" Durbe asked, he and his fellow Barians turning to face the group.
"We beat you once," Katie pointed out.
"You defeated us solely because of your Numbers," Mizael retorted. "Those victories were a testament to the Numbers' strength, not yours! Without them, you're nothing!"
"You're wrong!" Matt shouted back. "We're not nothing!"
"Then prove it!" Gilag called. And without a second's glance, he turned and ran straight for Professor Usur's computer, away from the Deltas. Durbe and Mizael spread out in a guarding formation, preventing the Deltas from running after Gilag.
The Stranger, however, was ready for him. As the colossal Barian bore down on her and aimed a punch at the side of her head, she brought her duel disk up and – in a prodigious display of strength – blocked the massive blow. The concrete beneath her feet cracked under the weight of the impact. The woman grinned – Gilag had forgotten how fast and strong a Barian could be, even in their human form.
Before Gilag could recover, the Stranger drew back her hand back, preparing to drive her palm into Gilag's stomach... but out of nowhere, Alit was suddenly at her other side, his fist drawn back. With no time to react, the Stranger felt the full weight of Alit's blow smash into her stomach, sending her flying across the roof, where she landed in a heap on the ground.
"No!" Skyler cried.
While Alit tended to the computer, Gilag marched casually over to the gasping woman, knelt down beside her, and closed his massive fingers around her left upper arm in a bone-crushing grip. She struggled to pull away, but to no avail.
"No you don't!" Leah cried, and both she and Dan hurtled towards the pair of them.
They'd only taken a few steps when Mizael noticed them. Raising a hand, his palm crackling with what seemed to be electrical energy, he fired a crimson sphere of energy at the pair of them, which exploded at their feet. Both Deltas were hurled back by the force of the explosion, landing heavily next their friends. James gave a small 'eep' of fright at the Barian Lord's power, and hid behind Katie.
Across the roof, Gilag paid this disturbance no heed.
"And as punishment for betraying us," he was saying, softly and menacingly, "you get to stay here on this dirtball of a planet forever." His fist tightened, and the dazed Stranger felt the cold metal of her Barialapis squeezing against her arm. Something had to give. Either it would snap, trapping her in her human form forever, or her arm would break. Or both. Probably both, in fact. And judging from the look in Gilag's eyes, he didn't care which came first...
Matt started forwards, his duel disk held before him like a shield. He didn't know what he was doing, only that he couldn't allow the Stranger – who had somehow become one of their comrades overnight – to be harmed. Behind him, Skyler began to follow, his robotic arm clenched in a solid fist. Mizael turned his sights on them, and his hand began to crackle once more.
But then, something happened to Skyler's vision.
A terrible clarity had come over his sight, allowing him to perceive tiny details about the world, as if in slow motion. And his focus was zoned in – as if pulled there by a magnet – on one detail in particular. Sounds died away, the commotion seemed to fade into insignificance, and everything seemed to shift aside to reveal something that chilled Skyler to his very core, even if he couldn't explain why.
Professor Usur was on his feet again, a move that had gone unnoticed in all the commotion. He was staring unblinkingly up at the Sphere Field, the yellow light reflected in his wild eyes.
Clasped in his right hand was a tiny silver trigger device, with a bright red button on top.
Skyler tried to shout, to alert someone. But the Deltas were all so focussed on Gilag and the Stranger – and Durbe and Mizael so focussed on the Deltas – that his cries went unheard. Alit, however, had spotted it, and had launched himself away from the computer and towards the Professor, his fist raised. He didn't know what the trigger device was, but was prepared to strike the Professor down before he allowed him to use it.
Too late. With a wild howl, Professor Usur brandished the trigger above his head, and pressed the button.
The Sphere Field exploded.
The calamity below was utterly lost as the pale yellow sphere was blasted apart – seemingly from the inside – filling the sky with blazing white light. The twelve still-conscious people on the roof ceased their individual fights and struggled to stay on their feet as the building rocked alarmingly. High above them, the explosion rippled across the sky, forcing the clouds outwards as it went. Windows shattered for miles around, giant cracks appeared in the buildings immediately surrounding them, and distant crashes, screams, and horns erupted from within the city.
With the sound of rushing wind, the Numbers broke free of their now-obliterated prison and shot off in all directions, soaring away like a hundred shimmering comets. Some darted down into the city, others kept flying all the way out of the city and out of sight. The ones that entered the city itself had disappeared from view, but a few seconds after they had, the screams intensified.
One, however, had stayed behind.
As the explosion subsided – the blaze of light fading from the sky – and the building grew still once more, a single orb of light shot down from above and stopped, hovering, behind the stunned Deltas, well away from the building. There, it began to grow silently. The kids hardly noticed it – they were still struggling to their feet, massaging their various injuries and staring in horror at where the Sphere Field had been moments before. Durbe and Mizael, who'd been directly beneath it, were slower to rise.
"What... just happened...?" Katie gasped, clutching at her injured shoulder.
"I don't know," Matt said, helping a still-unsteady Leah to her feet. "What happened to the Numbers?"
"Usur blew up the Sphere Field..." Skyler breathed. He seemed just as shell-shocked as the rest of them. "All the Numbers... they're gone..."
"Gone where?" Dan asked.
"Scattered, all over the world," Skyler replied. "All the hard work we spent trying to gather them-"
"James, behind you!" the Stranger suddenly shouted.
Skyler and the Deltas wheeled around. Hovering behind them, just off of the edge of the building, was a giant mechanized monster, its metal-plated white body taking on the crude shape of a moth, with a royal purple underside and gold trim. Its arms – connected to it only by an arc of blue electricity – were both pointing at James as if they were cannons. All of them recognised it at once; it was Synthetic Moth, a Number that had belonged to Skyler, was since taken by Lithon, and had finally been owned by Leah up to now.
Number 45: Synthetic Moth: Machine-Type/Xyz/EARTH/Rank 4/ATK 2300/DEF 1500 – 0 OLU
As they laid eyes upon it, the creature suddenly fired a barrage of missiles at them from concealed sections of its arms. The Deltas and Skyler dived out of the way, and the explosions ripped up sections of the roof, pelting them with concrete. Lithon and Kodoku, where were barely stirring, were incredibly lucky not to be hit.
Almost as soon as the blasts had subsided, Synthetic Moth – powered by jets on its back – soared through the smoke towards Matt, where it aimed a punch at the boy with its metal arm. Matt rolled out of the way, and felt the tiny breath of wind across his skin as the blow missed him by inches. The ground shake beneath him as metal struck concrete. He came to a stop on his back and saw, too late, that his roll had taken him directly underneath the Number's other arm, which was now pointed squarely at his face.
"Matt, no!" Leah screamed.
Tiny hatches opened up on Synthetic Moth's arm. Matt could actually see the heads of the missiles that were about to be fired at him at point blank range...
A brilliant, emerald-green beam of energy suddenly struck Synthetic Moth in the side, sending it spinning off of Matt. Both Durbe and Mizael were forced to leap out of the way as the robotic Number was smashed it into the concrete of the roof right where they'd been standing.
For a second, Matt genuinely believed he had just been shot. As the shock wore off, however, he was able to look around and see something incredible, hovering directly over Gilag's head. A large, synthetic-looking angel, with black skin covered by golden armour. Its feathery wings were spread wide, flapping slightly to keep it airborne, its purple shawl still wrapped around its neck. Its left arm was raised, its palm pointing directly at Synthetic Moth.
Number 17: Passion Aurora: Fairy-Type/Xyz/LIGHT/Rank 5/ATK 2500/DEF 1700 – 0 OLU
"Passion Aurora!" Leah cried, both shocked and overjoyed.
The Number nodded once, then, without warning, fired a second attack at Synthetic Moth – who had been attempting to get missile lock on the enemy Number – blasting it off its feet and clean over the edge of the roof. For a moment, it seemed defeated. Then it soared up once more, its body battered and smoking, but intact. It didn't make to attack Passion Aurora a second time, however, but instead flew off in the opposite direction, fleeing from the superior Number as fast as it could.
Its job done, Passion Aurora lowered its hand and turned to look out to the city, its glowing eyes troubled. It remained thus while the Deltas attempted to make sense of what had happened.
"You ok Matt?" Dan asked, helping the boy back to his feet.
Matt was a little unsteady for a moment, then nodded in thanks and turned to Skyler. "When you said that the Numbers were scattered," he said, trying to keep the accusatory tone out of his voice, "you didn't mention that they'd all come to life as well."
"I didn't know," Skyler growled.
"Yeah... how the hell is that even possible anyway?" James asked, still clinging onto Katie's arm.
"No idea, but I know who might." Striding across the rooftop, straight past Alit and Gilag, who were helping Mizael and Durbe up, Matt walked straight over to where the Stranger was standing, staring out into the city.
"I can feel them..." she muttered, seemingly oblivious as Matt approached. "They're furious, they're hungry... they'll tear this planet to pieces to sate their anger..." She then turned to face Matt, who noted the look of utter terror on her face. "You can hear them, can't you? The screams. The Numbers are attacking the people in this city."
"How did this even happen?" Matt asked as the screams from the city below seemed to intensify.
"Usur's doing..." The woman turned back to face out into the city. "He ripped the Sphere Field holding the Numbers apart, and used the resulting energy to shatter the ties they have to their cards. They're free to burn, murder, and destroy all they want now..."
"How... how do we stop them?" Matt asked. He could feel the fear rising in his chest.
"There's no stopping them... our extraction techniques won't work now they've manifested as real creatures," she replied. "They'll kill everyone on this planet as punishment for their enslavement. And soon enough, Miden and Apeiros will find each other again... and this world will end."
Matt swore, and glared at the Professor, who seemed oblivious to everything. He was on his knees again, staring up at where the Sphere Field had been, murmuring something under his breath.
"We can't just give up!" he said angrily. "There has to be a way. Maybe the Barians-" Even as he spoke, he glanced across at the four aliens, just in time to see the four of them evaporating into a swarm of light particles, which disappeared into a portal and out of sight. "Hey! Come back! Where're you going?!"
"They're leaving," the Stranger muttered. "They know this world is a lost cause... all those people..." A single tear slid down her cheek.
"Stop being so defeatist!" Matt shouted, as his friends ran over to join them. "We have a duty to this world! We have to do what we can stop the Numbers! We have to-"
"YOU!"
Matt stopped mid-sentence and, turning to the source of the shout, saw Skyler grabbing Professor Usur by the shoulders, forcing him over to the wall at the edge of the building, and slamming him against it.
"Skyler, leave him!" Katie called.
"Screw that," James said. "Maybe he can tell us how to stop the Numbers. I'm all for beating some ideas out of him."
Skyler paid none of them any attention.
"You... you cretin!" he snarled, his face inches from Usur's. "Do you realise what you've done? Millions upon millions of people are going to die – this entire world is going to end – all because of you! I thought you wanted to save it!"
Usur said nothing.
"Talk!" Skyler shouted, shaking him. "Why would you do that?! The people of this planet are gonna be killed and consumed by the Numbers! Why would you choose to murder so many?! Was it for a reason? To spite the Barians? For fun? Answer me!"
A short silence then followed, as Skyler waited for the Professor to respond, and the Deltas listened on tenterhooks. And then, the most awful thing happened. Usur looked at Skyler with dazed eyes, and a wide, grotesque smile spread across his face.
"Let them feast..." he whispered.
Skyler's hands shook, and he stared into the Professor's demented gaze with something far beyond hatred. Slowly, deliberately, he released his hold on the Professor's coat and took a small step back, his robotic fist involuntarily clenching and unclenching at his side.
Then, without warning, he lunged forward...
... and shoved the Professor over the wall.
It seemed to happen in slow motion. Matt watched in horror as Usur disappeared over the edge of the building, and flung himself over to the wall to watch. Professor Usur, the man who had taken them in form the very start, who had caused so much misery and pain, and who had been their final and greatest enemy, was now falling to his death. The expression on his face was quickly changing from demented joy to slight surprise, as his brain struggled to process what was currently happening. Then the Professor turned over in the air, his face becoming concealed as he plummeted towards the ground, his coat flapping wildly around him. Now he would be able to see the ground below, the cracked and broken concrete littered with stones and shards of glass, rushing up to meet him...
Matt had seen enough. Furious, he rounded on Skyler to berate him for what he'd done... and got a nasty shock. Skyler was standing stock still, his chest heaving, his eyes wide. His hands were resting on the wall he'd just pushed Usur over, and he was leaning over it, his eyes fixed on the falling Professor.
On his face, visible to Matt and no-one else, was the most radiant expression of elation and bliss Matt had ever seen.
Author-made cards:
Number 45: Synthetic Moth (credit to Gardevrose45)
Machine-Type/Xyz/EARTH/Rank 4/ATK 2300/DEF 1500
2 Level 4 monsters
This card cannot be destroyed by battle, except by a "Number" monster. Once per turn: You can detach 1 Overlay Unit from this card, then target 1 face-up monster (except this card) each player controls; return those targets to the hand, and if you do, this card gains ATK equal to the difference between those targets' original ATKs on the field, until the end of your opponent's next turn.
Number 17: Passion Aurora
Fairy-Type/Xyz/LIGHT/Rank 5/ATK 2500/DEF 1800
2 Level 5 monsters
This card cannot be destroyed by battle, except by a "Number" monster. Neither player can Special Summon monsters. During either player's turn: You can detach 1 Overlay Unit from this card; negate this card's effects until the end of this turn.
Fun Fact #132: Welp, Skyler got his revenge at last. Bye bye Usur. No-one will miss you. Oh, in other news, welcome to the end of the world.
Fun Fact #133: Yep, pinching ideas from my bookshelf again (Pullman and Horowitz, to be precise). Skyler's vision-clarity part was adapted from a section of The Amber Spyglass, where a bunch of jerks try to blow up the main character using her hair. In a few of the next chapters, you may start seeing elements drawn from Necropolis too – which, incidentally, is still one of my favourite books, even better than Oblivion in my opinion.
Fun Fact #134: I can confirm that, despite recent events, Usur is still a jerk. A rather flat and decidedly squishy jerk, but a jerk nonetheless.