EchoGirl: Okay-dokes, here's the chapter for all you patient readers out there.

Goldfish: Uh-huh. Can I get that dynamite?

EchoGirl: Nope. Now do the disclaimer. You can plot world domination later.

Goldfish: Fine. But then I get the dynamite! EchoGirl319 does not own Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's.

EchoGirl: Excellent.

Goldfish: Now can I get the dynamite?

EchoGirl: No.

A Rose in the Stars

Chapter 42

Destiny lay propped up against the pillows on the pure white hospital bed, hissing in pain whenever she so much as tried to shift her position, even one slight movement of her upper body was enough to make her feel like her chest was on fire. Bloody ribs. Sayer's damn dragon must have broken at least three of them. And now she was confined to a hospital bed, doing absolutely nothing and feeling absolutely useless. She hated being hospitalised; it made her feel so weak and incapable – not a feeling she particularly enjoyed.

I'd rather still be in a coma. At least reviewing her newly unlocked memories was actually interesting. There was little that was more exciting than reliving yourself bashing the King of the Underworld into a pulp, and the priceless look on Goodwin's face as she'd done it. My immortal soul is awesome, she concluded.

At least one good thing had come out of her encounter with Sayer – she'd gotten to meet Akiza. The thought filled her with joy and contentment, her mother was back and she finally felt complete. Seeing her face had been something she could only have dreamed of for years.

But she's back now, she told herself, and she's not going to leave again.

She had told Destiny herself; she wasn't going to run away again, and Destiny believed her. Despite the situation – she was lying on a hospital bed with at least three broken ribs having just woken up from a coma, having discovered that she was actually half the soul of a god and her ace monster was the other half, after duelling with a assumed dead psychopath hell bent on revenge – she couldn't help but feel rather pleased with herself. Her mission was accomplished. Boy, did her life have issues.

Dragging herself out of her thoughts, she looked around the small, very crowded hospital room. Everyone was squeezed inside, and Destiny didn't pretend not to know why. They wanted to know about her duel with Sayer, what he did, why it put her in a coma, what these strange marks on her body were and, most of all, why had the Crimson Dragon suddenly appear? It hadn't appeared in years. It hadn't been needed. She sighed and looked up at them. It was time for an explanation. The question was, would they believe it?


Akiza kept sending anxious glances at her daughter, who seemed completely lost in thought. She never, however, missed the winces and hisses of pain and frustration Destiny let out whenever she shifted on the bed. Her opinion of her former mentor was rapidly disappearing into the negatives.

Her eyes flicked around the room, glancing at its every occupant: Yusei beside her was focusing completely on Destiny, his cobalt eyes burning into the girl on the bed, his fists clenching whenever she hissed sharply; Jack was also watching her, his amethyst eyes narrowed, a cup of steaming coffee in one hand (after a lot of angry yelling, a firm blow from one of the former King's fists had finally got the coffee flowing from the machine); Crow, who was standing a little further off, had one arm around his daughter's shoulders and the former witch could not help but marvel at the similarity between them, especially their identical carrot coloured hair (luckily for Vanessa her hair wasn't quite the same style); Kalin was standing near the door, truth be told, Akiza didn't know what to think of Kalin, she knew that she definitely hadn't liked him when they'd first met, years ago, he'd been a Dark Signer and he'd tried to kill Yusei… but Yusei had assured her that he'd changed so, reluctantly albeit, she lowered her guard. The silver-haired man seemed to be looking at one of his identical twin sons, the look he had in his gold eyes quite clearly said 'don't try anything'; Bruno had his head cocked slightly to one side, a seemingly concerned look in his eyes; Leo was sitting slumped in the chair looking undeniably bored and Luna appeared to be speaking with her beloved Kuribon, Akiza didn't bother to try and pick up on the girl-younger woman's conversation. It was hard for her to come to grips with the fact that Luna and Leo had both grown up, hell, they were both twenty-seven now, they had been barely fourteen the last time she'd seen them.

Then there were the children, who'd filed into the room as soon as Destiny had woken up. Crow's daughter, Vanessa was her name, Vanessa Raven Hogan she'd been told. She couldn't help but roll her eyes at that, of course Crow would find a way to wheedle a type of bird into his daughter's name somehow. She had short messy bright orange hair that barely reached her chin and reminded Akiza of a bird's nest. She was eleven years old, the girl had told her, not particularly tall for her age with large dark green eyes. Then there were Kalin's twins, Christopher and Marcus Kessler, though they insisted on being known as Chris and Mark. Akiza had already forgotten which one was which – the others, however, seemed to have no problem identifying them – at least they weren't wearing the same clothes; that would be too complicated. They looked at lot like Kalin, pale with silvery blue hair and tall, skinny physiques; their eye and facial structures however were a bit different, the most notable being their pale blue eyes in stark contrast to Kalin's gold one's. Then there were Jack's… spawn. The girl, quite easily the youngest of the group, was rather sweet looking with jet black hair flowing to her mid-back and rather cute bangs. She resembled Carly a lot, and Akiza admitted that she always had had a certain fondness for the clumsy reporter, more so than she'd had for Jack's other admirers. She could, however, see Jack quite easily in the girl's face, the chin and nose and of course the unmistakable amethyst in her big, curious eyes. She supposed that that was why she was called Violet. Then there was him.

If Akiza had thought Vanessa looked like Crow then Jake Atlas was his father's clone. The same face, eyes, hair, everything. Even the height. He was the tallest of all the youths in the room and would definitely grow to be over six feet. He also, no doubt, had Jack's attitude. Fabulous. And he was sitting on the bed; one foot propped up, right next to Destiny. Their shoulders were touching! And Destiny didn't seem to mind! As soon as it came, Akiza instantly pushed the grandchildren comment from her mind. She glanced at Jack. Once this was all over they would definitely be having a talk.

Then Destiny cleared her throat. All eyes were immediately once again upon her.

"I suppose you want to know what happened between me and Sayer," she croaked, her voice had only been minimally exercised since she'd awoken.

"And…?" Chris asked, gesturing with his hand. "You almost gave us all heart attacks when you started floating. And then all the marks and dragon weirdness."

This was probably Chris; he was, apparently, the one that always got into trouble. She had also heard from the others that Jake, Chris, Mark and Vanessa had been present at the Arcadia Movement HQ when it had been begun to collapse and had witnessed Destiny's duel. She had then been told their side of the story – to say that she was surprised was an understatement.

Destiny's ace monster suddenly morphing into the Crimson Dragon? Even the Signer dragons couldn't do that. And what about those marks that now adorned her daughter's body? Apparently shed gotten angry, really angry, and they'd just appeared.

"Well, when we were duelling Sayer was talking about something called the Crimson Vessel and trying to get me 'to unleash the full extent of my true powers'."

"The Crimson Vessel?" Crow asked, "what's that?"

Destiny closed her eyes and took a deep breath, as if she were wondering how to explain something. "The Crimson Dragon," she began, "when in its true, complete form can only be summoned by the Signers to help them protect the earth. But you already know that."

The room's occupants nodded. This was common knowledge amongst those who knew of the legendary beast.

"Well, it is possible, for around one lifetime a century or so, for the Crimson Dragon to come to earth and, well, live and protect the earth itself, even if there are no Signers existing."

"How is that possible?" Jack demanded.

"What do you mean?" Luna asked at the same time.

"Yeah, how does that work?" Leo enquired.

"But to do so," Destiny continued, ignoring them, "it has to split its soul into two."

"As in two halves?" Akiza asked, "two different people?"

"No," Destiny shook her head, "not two people. A person and a duel monster."

Yusei nodded, "that makes sense. So much power would be impossible for just one being," he glanced at the Signers, "remember Goodwin when he tried to control the power of the Crimson Dragon and the King of the Underworld?"

"It destroyed him," Akiza murmured. It did make sense to split the dragon's soul into two, human and duel monster.

"The two halves of the dragon's soul are always destined to find each other, lest they will never be complete," Destiny continued, now using her hands to elaborate, "memories of the Crimson Dragon's experiences and quests and its infinite knowledge and power are sealed with the duel monster half and its personality, feelings, mind, conscience, being are sealed within its human half. Together, if the two halves fuse their soul they can temporarily unlock their true form and literally become the Crimson Dragon, their true form."

Everyone was silent, speechless. It was almost too much information to take in. The Crimson Dragon, the deity of the Signers, living, breathing, among them.

"And this… person is alive now?" Kalin asked. Destiny nodded.

"The Crimson Vessel. There are… conditions for the Vessel's birth though."

"Like?" Crow tilted his head.

"Well, the duel monster is always the same. It takes the form of the Crimson Dragon's unevolved, hatchling form."

The Crimson Dragon has an unevolved form? But Akiza wasn't going to ask and neither was anyone else. This was already almost too much information to take in.

"Do you know what this hatchling form looks like?" Bruno asked. Destiny nodded and reached for her deck on the bedside table, hissing in pain as she did so. Akiza felt her eyes widen as her mid spun. This didn't mean… did it?

She took the top card and tossed it at him with the skill and precision that Jack or Yusei would use when performing their card throwing tricks. Bruno, taken by surprise, didn't catch it and it hit him in the chest. Jack gave Destiny a tiny, almost unnoticeable nod.

"You've improved."

Destiny beamed at the compliment; Jack didn't often hand them out. Akiza rolled her eyes. What was so special about throwing a card? She watched carefully as Bruno turned the card over and his steel grey eyes widened immensely.

"But, Destiny!" he exclaimed, "this is your ace monster?"

Though they had all been suspecting it, everyone's head shot up at the announcement and Yusei held out his hand for the card from Bruno who passed it over.

"Red Destiny Dragon," he murmured. From her spot next to him, Akiza could see the picture of the beast and it was truly breathtaking in its red and white majesty. She reached out to touch its image, a small jolt passing through her as she brushed Yusei's hand in the process.

"It's beautiful," she whispered, and the champion turbo duellist glanced at her before passing the card back to Destiny, who held it lovingly in her hand.

"The Crimson Vessel," she told them, "also has to be the child of two Signers and it most Vessels – my past lives – live without the knowledge that they are actually half the soul of their parents' deity" (this, Akiza noticed, was the first time Destiny referred to herself as this Vessel) "and it takes a huge amount of a very powerful emotion to unlock their true abilities. In my case it was rage, Sayer pushed me to my emotional limits and I just, well, exploded. Metaphorically, of course," she added. "When that happens the Vessel's body becomes covered in six Crimson Dragon marks; one for each Signer and one for the Vessel themselves."

"How do you know all this?" Luna asked after a very long and uncomfortable pause.

"Red Destiny gave me all my past memories and knowledge when I was comatose," she explained, "I remember everything. Including all the times I saved your death-wish butts."

That earned a laugh, but this new knowledge still loomed ominously over them. Her daughter was actually half the soul of a being she'd once hated with all her heart. Now what?

"So you're…" Leo began, his olive eyes still wide with disbelief.

Destiny nodded and lifted her head to stare at everyone in the room with her soul-seeing sapphire eyes.

"Yes. I'm the Crimson Dragon."

There was another pause as the words, the finality of them sank in, before Destiny spoke again.

"Now when can we go home? My legs are stiff and I'm going to get cramps and I really, really want to get out of this stupid hospital gown."


EchoGirl: Well, that was interesting.

Goldfish: *muttering incoherently*

EchoGirl: *whispers* He's sulking 'cos I didn't give him any dynamite?

Goldfish: Did you say something?

EchoGirl: No, just that you should QUIT WHINING!

Goldfish: I was not whining?

EchoGirl: Ya think?

Goldfish: Yeah, I do!

EchoGirl: Oh, go plot WDTAHR or something. But tell the readers to review first!

Goldfish: Review, or else.

EchoGirl: I agree! Well, not with the 'or else' part but with the 'review' part. Hey, wait a sec, haven't we already had the threatening people converstation? Or do I have to send you to therapy?

Goldfish: You did already and they told you that receptionist they don't accept fish. Then I blew the place up and we got kicked out.

EchoGirl: Ah, yes, I remember. I never did like that receptionist.

Goldfish: Me neither.