A/N: Hey guys. First off, I'd like to thank those who have reviewed so far (I didn't think I'd get this many), and second, sorry for taking my time in updating (class registration can be a pain), but I will finish putting the story up this week. Anyway, on to the next chapter.
Chapter 5: Master of Torture
All three of them prepared themselves as the man stood there with his gun fixed at them.
"Hello Kaiba. And, you must be Sugoroku Motou and Katsuya Jounouchi," he said looking at the other two, "I've been waiting…"
"Who are you?!" Jounouchi demanded.
"My name is Norman Johnson. I was a card dealer until Kaiba gave a list of us, from Malik, to the authorities here. Since then, I've been setting up this place for my revenge upon Yugi, who caused all this by defeating Malik."
"Let my grandson go!" Grandpa shouted, "He did what he had to do!"
"Shut up, you old fart. Yugi's going to die after I deal with you."
"You asshole!" Jounouchi yelled, "If you hurt him, you will have signed your death warrant!"
"He must really be Yugi's best friend," Norman thought, "He's the one to be the victim of my little toy, but I will kill Kaiba first."
"Oh well, I mustn't stay too long. But before I go, I must take care of the one who gave this list to the authorities…"
Kaiba knew he was referring to him, as Norman pointed the gun at the target.
"See you in hell, Seto Kaiba!"
With out hesitation, Seto raised his duel disk sideways to Norman's eye level, tilted his head to the right, and activated it. This fired the two holographic emitters out of the disk to Seto's front and back, but at close proximity and high speed, the one in front hit Norman in the face, causing him to divert his attention. Seto took this opportunity to rush to him and slap the gun from his hand, knocking into the larger room. However, Norman took out a taser from his pocket and shocked Seto with the electrical discharge. With him stunned, Norman shoved Seto back and took off to the other room.
"Oh no you don't!" Jounouchi yelled as he ran into the room.
Grandpa went to Seto and attended to him. Then, two blast doors closed from the top and bottom of the only connection to the two rooms. Seto struggled to a sitting position before Grandpa could help him up.
"Are you ok, Kaiba?" he asked.
"I think so. But, that idiot is now in that man's clutches. We've got to get in there."
"But how?"
"I don't know. Those doors look like they are designed to take the explosion of a rocket…but they are probably controlled by a computer…!"
Seto touched the KC pin oh his jacket.
"Mokuba, can you here me?"
"Hai," his brother replied, "And I got the whole thing recorded."
"Can you detect a computer system in this place?"
"No Niisama."
"Kaiba, what about those computer's there?" Grandpa said.
"That's it. We could use them to interface with the system here. Mokuba," he addressed, "Can you hack into the system if I can get an uplink to it?"
"Hai."
Seto took out a wire from his pocket and attached it to his duel disk then hooked it up to the back of the computer and finally turned the computer on.
"If the duel disk is connected to the Kaiba Corporation satellite system, it should be able to let Mokuba interface with it thanks to the new upgrade to let the signal get though even inside a building," Seto explained to Grandpa.
"Got it, Niisama. It will take me a while to get into the system that controls the blast doors."
Jounouchi stopped running when he heard the blast door close. He tried to run back, but they closed before he was half way there.
"Damn! I shouldn't have been so impulsive!"
He turned around to see a dim lighted room, though he could make out several lights that seemed to belong to computer terminals. He walked forward cautiously.
"Jounouch-kun," he heard the Spirit say, "I can sense Yugi in this room, but he is still unconscious!"
"That bastard, Norman, must be here too…and he probably has that gun of his as well."
He then heard a devious laugh from the other side of the room.
"Welcome Jounouchi," Norman said, "to my site of revenge."
"Kisama, show yourself!" he commanded.
The lights turned on, and the Spirit of the Puzzle came out in spirit form. Both of them saw that it was a large room with holographic emitters to either side to which the terminals were attached. Norman was on the other side of the high roofed room, but Jounouchi immediately saw a cage where an unconscious Yugi was laying to the kidnapper's left.
"Yugi!!" he yelled out.
"Don't bother," Norman said, "he's out for a while, but he'll come back, good as new, in a few hours."
"Let him go!" Jounouchi demanded as he ran to the cage.
Norman, however, took out his Colt Defender, which stopped Jounouchi in his tracks. He waved the gun to signal the blond teenager to step back, to which the teenager did.
"Fine," he said smiling, "On one condition. You must beat me in a special duel."
"Nani!?"
"You heard me. I even have a pair of duel disks for this event," he said taking out two disks.
"What's the catch?" Jounouchi asked.
"Nothing much. You do have Yugi's deck, don't you?"
"It's with me."
"I will allow you to use it."
"Nani?"
"I was planning on using this on Yugi himself, but plans change you know. I want to test my recreation of Kaiba's system before I 'retire' from this business."
"I can't do that!" he thought, "I can't use his fighting spirit like this…"
"Jounouch-kun," the Spirit said, "Yes you can."
"Nani…"
"Listen, I'm with you now. Yugi would want you to use it if it meant fighting for someone you care about."
"Maybe…but I don't know how to use it."
"Then maybe you could use part of it."
"What do you mean?" Jounouchi thought as he saw the other Yugi in front of him in his mind.
"The power of friends is what empowers us, Jounouchi. If you want to fight with Yugi's spirit, you must unify it with your own."
"You mean…the decks…"
"Hai. I will guild you. You have your deck and Yugi's…your fighting spirits combined will win!"
"Norman!" he shouted, "I will duel with a combination both of Yugi's and my deck!"
"What? Oh well. It's only delaying the inevitable. I guess you'll want some time to construct it. Ten minutes!"
Jounouchi took out both decks from his pockets and sat down on the floor. As he looked though them, the other Yugi helped him in the process as Jounouchi began to mumble to him.
"What the hell is he talking to," Norman thought, "He must be going crazy."
Ten minutes passed, and Jounouchi got up.
"I'm ready."
"Good," Norman replied throwing a duel disk to Jounouchi, "However, I will be using a custom set of card I created myself."
"Custom cards?"
"Yes. These are fake card in the real game, but I've programmed the duel computer to accept them, and they are extremely unfair to the average player. I thought about submitting these to Malik, but we know that's impossible now."
"Great! Now he's using fake cards."
"We can do this, Jounouchi."
"But," Norman added, "What fun would this be without a little death to go with it…"
"Nani!?"
Suddenly, the floor under Jounouchi moved forward and two poles, connected by a ring, came up from under him as it stopped. The twenty-inch long ring came up to his hips and began to make a hissing noise. Astonished, he could only watch as, in a single second, an inflated air bag, similar to an old blood pressure machine, held him tightly in place, and a small twenty-inch by five-inch slot in the floor opened up from under him.
"What is this?" he questioned.
"It's simple, Jounouchi. Do you know of the impaling method of execution in the Middle Ages of Europe?"
"Not really. I don't pay much attention in World History class."
"Too bad. It will be used in this duel. If, and when, your life points drop to zero, this method will carry itself out. A good-sized, pointed spike in below you, and when you lose, it will slowly come up. Since you cannot move your lower torso, it will make its way up to your poor, poor butt. After such time, it will penetrate your clothes and make its way up your rectal."
Jounouchi twitched in disgust.
"It will take time for it to move up inside your body and reach your heart to finish you off, so you will experience excruciating pain for…oh…five hours at the minimum."
"You sick freak."
"And after this duel," Norman said seemingly not hearing Jounouchi's remark, "I'm going to open the blast doors and kill Kaiba and Yugi's grandfather. When Yugi does wake up, he will see your impaled body and his dead grandfather, causing a delightful display of despair, sadness, and perhaps even anger from him. Then, I'll kill him, sell his deck, and hop the next banana boat to some place south…maybe Rio."
"That's not going to happen," Jounouchi declared.
"Are you saying you are going to win?"
"I will win."
"Then, let me see you prove that."
The holographic system activated when the disks set themselves and locked into place. Both of them said the familiar "Duel" before the battle and drew five cards each.
"I'll allow you the first move," Norman said.
"Fine," Jounouchi said drawing one more card.
"Ok, I've got Card Destruction, Alligator's Sword, Bottomless Trap Hole, Raise Dead (Monster Reborn), Big Shield Gardna, and Magnet Warrior Beta."
"Beta's the best bet for now," the other Yugi suggested.
"Magnet Warrior Beta in attack mode," Jounouchi said putting the card down, causing the holographic image to appear, "Set down one card. End my turn."
"Ok," Norman said drawing a card, "Summon Gemini Elf in attack mode…"
"Activate trap card," Jounouchi said pushing the appropriate button, "Bottomless Trap Hole!"
As the monster appeared, a large pit formed under it. The two elves shouted as they fell into the hole, its echoes being heard for a couple of seconds.
"Damn it!" Norman cursed as the hole closed, "Set one card face down. End my turn."
"This guy shouldn't be too much trouble," Jounouchi thought drawing another card.
"But," the other Yugi added, "He my be trying to deceive you. We don't know what that face-down card is."
"Hm. I've fallen into plenty of traps before, but not now."
"Magnet Warrior Beta, direct attack!"
The monster put its magnet hands forward and fired an energy bean at Norman, who felt a small pinch of pain as the attack was executed. Now his life points were at 2300.
"Set one card face-down," Jounouchi said slipping one card into the disk, making the larger image appear face down, "End my turn."
Norman drew and smiled.
"Critter (Sangan) ready to attack. End my turn."
"What the hell is he doing?" Jounouchi questioned as the monster appeared.
"He must think he's safe."
"What do you mean?"
"I can tell he's not an experienced duelist and must think that you will not attack in fear of Critter's effect."
"Baka," he thought referring to his opponent, "In doing so he leaves himself open. I have to take this opportunity."
"Alligator's Sword in attack mode," Jounouchi declared as the sword armed reptile appeared, "Alligator's Sword, attack the Critter!"
The lizard warrior jumped forward with its sword in a striking position.
"Fool!" Norman shouted.
He pushed a button on the duel disk. Jounouchi's monster was within inches of the Critter when a red beam fired from behind it and stopped the attack.
"Nani?!"
"You've fallen into my little trap, you idiot."
Jounouchi saw the beam coming from Norman's now revealed face down card. It turned into a stone tower with thorns growing around it, a pentagram at the top, and a ring of people chanting around it.
"What the heck is that?" Jounouchi asked.