Welcome to the Rebellion

Prologue

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It doesn't take a majority to make a rebellion; it takes only a few determined leaders and a sound cause.

H.L. Mencken

Fusion Dimension

Somewhere in the ocean is Duel Academia. A duel school that trains its students to become Duel Soldiers. These soldiers are sent to invade the other dimensions and seal their people into cards. This is done for the ARC Area Project, to make all worlds become one and create a utopia that will bring peace. They didn't care if the residents of the dimensions want to or not.

Sitting in a throne room is a middle-aged tan-skinned bald man in a purple-colored militaristic outfit, a purple cape, and a pair of gray boots. The left side of his head is encased in an armored plate with a red circular lens.

He is the Professor. Leader of Academia and the ARC Area Project.

"You are wondering why I summoned you," The Professor spoke to a cloaked figure standing before him. "I have received word from my spy in the Xyz dimension that he has located a person I sent him to find. You are to meet up with him and secure her at once. She has an important role in the ARC Area Project."

"Understood Professor," The cloaked person said with a smile. "I shall go and bring back this person's card."

"NO!" The Professor shouted at him. The cloaked person twitched as if surprised by this reaction. "You are not to card her. She must be brought to me unharmed and unspoiled. Is that clear?"

"Understood Professor. I will not fail you."

The person turned and left the throne room. Unbeknownst to them, a cat was watching them from an alcove of the throne room. On its yellow collar is a glowing red watch piece. After Yuri left, the cat stalked off to an open vent. Traversing the ventilation maze-like it knew the way, it exits several minutes later to a dark corridor.

From the shadows, a female wearing a silver mask. She closed the door behind her before taking it off to reveal curly light auburn hair. She wore what looked to be a blue male uniform with white pants. On her left arm is a glowing red watch. The cat looked at her attire and seemed to snicker.

"Nice look Noir," The cat joked. "How does it feel to be part of the Obelisk Force?"

"Horrendous I assure you, Mona," Noir replied with a frown. "I figured that with these masks they are wearing, it would make moving around much easier. If I'm discovered, I can always use the cloak function of my duel disk."

"You're going to have to act the part to pull it off. That and you need to disguise your duel disk," Mona said. His feline face frowned. "Did you find the room?"

"I did," Noir nodded. "I finished uploading the virus into the Academia database. Sophie is updating ours as we speak."

"Let's celebrate later. We need to contact everyone. It's urgent!"

XYZ Dimension

Deep underground, a door opened. Three people filed in, the last one closing it and activating the electronic lock. One is a blue-haired teen wearing a grey-brown coat over a patterned dark blue, electric blue, and black tunic shirt, black pants, and ankle boots faced a tunnel and cupped his mouth with his hands.

"Anyone here?" He called out, his voice echoing off the tunnels. The girls stared at him like he'd grown a second head.

"Really, Fox?" A blonde girl with pigtails hissed. She wore a turtleneck with a black bow, white skirt, black leggings, red converse shoes, and a cream and brown jersey overcoat with multiple pins and patches and a black hood. "You want whatever is hiding in the dark to wake up and get us?"

"I wouldn't worry about Inari's mess up, Panther," An orange-haired girl said as she held up her duel disk and activated a flash. She wore a green oversized hoodie with a pixelated purple alien creature on the front, black tights, two loose blue studded belts hanging off her hips, and calf-length black leather boots. "I doubt anybody got in with the security I had to crack. Maybe I can get the chance to improve it."

"I suspect that they wanted to make sure that only the right people found this place, Oracle." Fox gestured down a set of stairs. "Shall we?"

Together, the three of them descended the stairs. They entered a room that looked like an abandoned subway tunnel. It was still dark, but they are going to change that. Panther walked over to a console and typed a few keys. Seconds later, the auxiliary power kicked in.

"Let there be light!" Panther called out as the lights kicked in. The three of them deactivate their flashlights.

"Wow! Look at this place!" Oracle said as she looked around the room. "It's like hackers haven!"

"Whoever set this up must have a fine taste for the streets," Fox said as he framed a wall of graffiti with his fingers. Behind him, the blonde girl looked at a couch with sadness. The dust had started to gather, but it looked as if it was occupied with the furnishings and computer equipment.

"Do you think that one of his friends might have set this up?" Panther asked. "I mean…our duel disks detected this place because of the Sophie node."

"Possibly," The blue-haired teen said while looking down. "I don't want to get his hopes up but…according to him, the possibility of survivors is almost slim."

"It's actually less than ninety-seven percent."

Panther and Fox slightly jumped at the artificial female voice. They nearly forgot the AI passenger in their duel discs.

"Sorry Sophie," Panther spoke to her duel disk. "I'm going, to be honest, we completely forgot that you were still with us."

"Don't worry, you'll get used to me eventually," Sophie said. "Now then…shall we expand my dominance to the Xyz dimension?"

"Found the servers!" Oracle announced at the other end of the tunnel. "Just reactivated them!"

"Excellent. Only two more to go and the Network will be completely restored. Oh, hang on. I got an incoming transmission from our spies in Academia."

"Really?" Panther asked in surprise. "Put them through."

"Certainly. If you will please make your way to the multiple screens where Oracle has taken her seat."

Panther and Fox moved to the designated location. They saw an eager Oracle sitting before a holographic screen. The placeholder vanished to show the face of Noir with a worried look.

"Panther. Fox. Oracle." Noir called. "You've already set up the Xyz safehouse?"

"We have. You could say that it was set up long before we got here," Panther answered. "Now why did you call?"

"It would be best if everybody was here for this."

Synchro Dimension

"Is this everything?"

"Not quite. We need only a few more things before we've restocked the safehouse supplies."

Two people are walking down the street in the commons, each of them carrying groceries. One is a teenager with spiky dyed blond hair wearing a red hoodie with a black skull and the word 'NOBODY' on the front, a blue shirt plaid pants, and purple sneakers.

His companion is a girl a year older than him with brown hair in a bob cut with blunt bangs and a French-braid styled headband matching it. She wore a large black overcoat with a black shirt, black pantyhose, and dress shoes.

One common thing they had are the glowing red duel disks on their left wrists.

"Lucky for us, they accept the same currency as our dimension," The boy muttered. "When we get back to the safehouse, I'm going for a ride on one of those D-Wheels"

"The last thing we need is to get the attention of Security," The girl scolded. "We need to keep a low profile if we are going to operate."

"Believe me, I know the mission," The boy muttered. Then his brow furrowed. "Still though…those guys at the tops really rub me the wrong way…"

"I know your frustrations, but we have bigger priorities at the moment like…WATCH OUT!"

"Huh? What are you…OH SHIT!"

The two of them leaped to opposite sides in time to avoid a white D-Wheel speeding past them. The D-Wheel crashed into a nearby wall, kicking up a smoke cloud.

"What the hell?" The boy exclaimed. During the process of evading, they lost their grip on the groceries. They began to gather as much back into the bags.

"Yugo!" A girl with green hair called out as she came running towards the crashed D-Wheel. The driver had just gotten off the D-Wheel and took off his helmet to reveal a young boy with blue and yellow hair. "Are you alright?"

"I think so," Yugo said. Then, the girl punched him in the back hard. "OW! What was that for Rin?"

"I told you that the brakes weren't ready!" Rin scolded. "I told you several times and you didn't listen! You nearly got those people killed to your stupidity."

She turned and ran to where the aforementioned people were. She began to help them out with their scattered groceries. Yugo joined in as well, having a regretful look on his face.

"I am so sorry!" Rin apologized. "This wasn't supposed to happen. Please don't call security on us!"

She reached over and grabbed Yugo's ear to force him to bow. "Say you're sorry!"

"Alright! I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"

"No worries," The girl assured her as he accepted a fallen carton of milk from Rin. "Nobody got hurt. It was a complete accident. Besides, we wouldn't dream of calling Security down here."

"Really?" Rin asked. "You mean it?"

"Let's just say that we got problems with guys in authority," The boy answered as they stood up. His companion walked over with her bag of groceries. "As much as anyone here in the commons does."

"What he said," The girl held out a hand. "I'm Makoto Nijima."

"Ryuji Sakamoto," The boy introduced as well. He looked at their D-Wheel and whistled. "I gotta say, that's a sweet D-Wheel you got there."

"It should be!" Yugo puffed out his chest with pride. "I and Rin built it ourselves!"

"Until you damaged it with your latest stunt!" Rin snapped. Yugo flinched at the death glare she was giving him. She once again gave the two an apologetic look. "We were installing new brakes into our D-Wheel. Yugo wanted to test them on the streets, but I insisted that we test them in the garage. As you can see…"

"Hey, no sweat," Ryuji said with a grin. "If you hadn't, you wouldn't have realized that the brakes weren't working."

"Yeah," Yugo agreed. "I tried to brake, and they weren't working."

"That still doesn't excuse the stunt you pulled!" Rin shouted.

Makoto sighed as she agreed with her. Just what we need. Another Skull…

"If you want, we could help fix your brakes," Makoto offered to their surprise. "If the damage is extensive, we can spare a few parts."

"Really?" Rin asked. "We don't want to trouble you after the near-death experience we gave you. And we barely have any money…"

"It's no trouble," Makoto assured her. "Don't worry about payment. Maybe a few tips on D-Wheel riding you can give us?"

"Sure thing!" Yugo said with a smile. "Just leave it up to me, the future riding duel king!"

"We want to compete in the Friendship Cup and Jack Atlas," Rin explains as she pushed him to the side. "It's been a dream of ours since childhood."

"That's pretty cool!" Ryuji said. Before he could comment further, they heard a familiar artificial voice.

"Incoming Priority Message."

"What was that?" Yugo asked, looking around for the source of the voice. Ryuji and Makoto looked at each other.

"Ryuji will check it out," Makoto said pointedly with a sharp glare. "Right?"

"Okay!" Ryuji nodded a little too frantic. As Makoto conversed with Yugo and Rin, he walked a few feet before he rolled up his sleeve to reveal a duel disk with a glowing red interface. He leaned his head forward and whispered to it.

"What's up?"

Standard Dimension

"Are you certain of this?" A guy with messy black hair asked. His duel disk displayed several holographic screens each showing his comrades…his friends. While he was glad that interdimensional communication is working, he was more concerned about what Noir had reported.

"I am," Noir spoke from her screen. "Mona witnessed the professor send a guy after someone in the Xyz Dimension. Whoever she was, he wanted her brought to Academia unsealed."

"Joker, do you know who the person they're after is?" Skull asked.

"He suffered amnesia for four years after arriving in our dimension, OF COURSE, he knows!" Panther sarcastically yells.

"Mona says that you took the words right out of his mouth," Noir said.

"I'm confused as you, Skull," Joker said before another fight could break out. He was palming his head in frustration. This didn't make any sense. The Arc Area Project was all about conquering dimensions and turning people into cards to power a machine, not taking any prisoners back to Academia. Was there something that he missed all those years ago?

"In any case, we can't ignore this," Joker said, pushing those thoughts aside for the moment. "Panther, I want you, Fox, and Oracle on this. Find whoever this person is and get her to safety. I don't know what the Professor wants with this person, but it can't be good. Remember…duel only as a last resort."

"We're on it, Joker," Panther nodded with determination. Her screen disappeared as she, Fox, and Oracle signed off.

"Skull. Queen. Stay alert. It is likely Academia sent a spy to the Synchro Dimension to perform recon for another invasion. With the Network reactivated, Sophie should be able to ID them thanks to the update from Noir and Mona."

"You got it, Joker," Skull responded. Even if he couldn't see it, he could tell that his friend was grinning. "Can't wait to test out the toys your pals made. Especially the D-Wheels."

"I'll make sure he stays focused," Queen groaned. With that, both of them signed off. Joker looked at Noir's screen with concern.

"Noir, your mission remains the same. But if anything goes wrong, call us."

"Will do," Noir replied. "Noir out!"

When the last screen faded, Joker lowered his arm.

"Something bugging you, Joker?" Sophie asked.

"It's just…I don't feel comfortable getting them involved in this war. Academia already wiped us out years ago…what if they suffer the same fate as my comrades?"

"Academia would've come for them sooner or later," Sophie said. "If they figured out where the transporter really sent you, they would've invaded Links as well."

"Links? Is that what we're calling that dimension?" Joker asked with a hint of amusement.

"If you've got a better name, my processors are always open. The point I'm trying to make is that your mindset has contradictions. Would you rather have Academia invade Links where your friends will be caught with their pants down like Xyz or would you rather go down swinging like a man?"

"Academia took everything from me that night," Joker said in a dark tone. He pushed up his glasses and the light reflected ominously off them. "Now they've taken everything from Xyz. They're not going to stop until everybody is a card. I'm going to make my survival mean something."

"We all will make sure it means something," a female voice corrected. Joker turned to see a red-haired girl walking behind the counter. She wore a black turtleneck under a black and gold embroidered jacket. Red hair is tied into a ponytail with a red ribbon.

"Sumire…"

"I know that you're scared for us Senpai," Sumire said as she caressed his cheek. "But you and the others have faced worse, haven't you? I only joined you to save reality itself. Now, I'm going to help you win this time. All of us are here to help you."

Joker stared at her. Then, he felt his hand touch hers. "You guys gave up so much to help me. Thank you…"

They gazed into each other's eyes for a moment.

"I'd hate to interrupt this lovely moment," Sophie interrupted, snapping them out of their trance. "But I'm picking up our first customers."

"Oh!" Sumire backed away from him. "I'd better get the kitchen ready."

Regardless of his feelings, his stomach clenched at her cooking. As she left to get the kitchen set up, Joker donned an apron and made himself presentable at the counter. He just smoothed out the wrinkles when the door opened.

"Hi, welcome to Leblanc," Joker called. A young teenage boy with crimson eyes and dual-colored green and crimson hair looked around the café. On his forehead are a pair of golden goggles on his forehead with a blue star obscuring the right lens.

"I haven't seen this café around town before," The boy commented.

"It's no surprise. We recently just opened," Joker said with a smile. "You have the luxury of being our first customer. Can I get you anything?"

"Sure! Do you have ice cream?"

"As a matter of fact, we do. Can I get your order mister…?"

"Sakaki. My name is Yuya Sakaki."

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And with that, the prologue is complete, and I hope you enjoyed it. The Phantom Thieves are here, and the trickster game has begun. I couldn't resist fanfic where the Phantom Thieves take on Leo Akaba and his forces. What happens next, only time will tell.

Brief heads up, this isn't going to be one of those fanfics where the characters end up in another world and all that reincarnation stuff. I have something different in mind. Think of it as a 'what if' scenario, as in what if there is a will of rebellion in the Fusion Dimension long before the events of Arc-V. But don't take my word for it. You can find out for yourself in the next chapter (if there ever will be). Also, I may end up using the English translation of the cards, but I approve of the subbed version of the anime than the dub. It's more honest.

Also, this is a reboot of the first version of this fic. It was going without direction, so I decided to do it over. They're not going to be stealing hearts just yet, but I promise that will still be a thing here. Fair warning and this should've come first, spoilers are ahead for those who haven't played the game.

Let me know in the reviews if I should continue this fic. If you approve, I'll get to work on the Phantom Thieves decks. Also, I have no intention of making their decks purely fictional like the anime. I intend to use actual cards for their decks. What their decks will be will remain to be seen.

Next Chapter: The Fox and the Panther