Welcome to Camelot?

Disclaimer: Don't own.

A quick recap: Six of the Yu-gi-oh characters are somehow transported back to the time of King Arthur. Welcome to Camelot: a place of steel and spells, a place where evil power has long lain dormant...

Chapter 1: Time Traveling

It had been late summer by the time Gawain's father let him ride back to Camelot – or more accurately, by the time his stepmother did. Morgan le Fay was used to being obeyed. By her family, her friends, and her enemies.

Gareth and Gaheris were still too young to start their training as squires. Like Gawain, they had known since they were very young that they wanted to be knights. Some of Morgan's stubbornness must have rubbed off on her three stepsons, for it was a trait infamous to their house.

Gawain had considered taking a squire of his own for a long time. He could use the extra help, after all, and sometimes his fellow knights had nagged him about it. There had been rumours of war, of course, and many of the local lads were eager for a fight.

That hadn't been his excuse to get away from Morgan, of course. He'd given her some vague tale about receiving an urgent summons from the king. And Morgan, while being a sorceress, couldn't defy her ruler, her own half-brother.

Gawain had met Sir Percival about halfway there – he'd been participating in a tourney near Joyous Gard – and they had ridden together until they reached Camelot.

It was there that things had taken a turn for the worse.

xxxxx

The worst mistake Yugi had made that night was falling asleep.

Yes, it had been a perfectly ordinary day. Yes, everything had been perfectly normal, nothing unexpected or strange. He'd been lying awake in bed around eleven, counting the cracks in the ceiling. Soon enough he'd fallen asleep.

And then he had woken up.

And he was in an entirely different place.

His first reaction had been to scream and cover his head with a pillow, but within minutes he grew brave enough to take another look at his surroundings. This time he didn't scream. It wasn't his bedroom at home, not by a long shot. He was in a small stone room, filled with what looked like three cots. He himself was lying on one, instead of in his own bed.

Yugi, what's wrong?

Yugi tried desperately to think of an excuse. Uh...nothing. Everything's normal.

You're not telling me the truth.

Without a further word, the pharaoh separated from the keeper of his Puzzle, forming a translucent, ghostlike body that would allow him to see the situation through his own eyes. Ghost or not, the aforementioned eyes abruptly expanded to the size of trashcan lids.

"Where in all hell are we?"

Yugi looked around. The other three cots held three other boys. Yugi was nearly shocked out of his wits when he recognized the sandy-haired head of Katsuya Jounouchi. The boy mumbled something in his sleep.

Suddenly, there was an explosion of noise, coming through the wall. Maybe there was another room to their left. But whatever the case, the level of volume increased suddenly. There could be heard through the general confusion several outbursts, what seemed to be part of a shouted conversation:

"I SWEAR I'LL SET MY LAWYER ON YOU!"

"GIVE ME BACK MY RING!"

"NOT UNTIL YOU LET GO OF ME!"

The last one to speak added a rather long string of curses in what sounded like Egyptian, and then the two fell silent. Yugi quickly shook Jounouchi awake. "Jou! Get up!"

He blinked sleepily, caught sight of where he was -- or more like where he was not -- and yelped.

At that moment a very frazzled-looking Seto Kaiba flung open the door to the small room, moved to one side of the door, and slammed it shut again. He leaned against the door for several seconds, panting, until he noticed the two boys and one spirit staring at him. "So, mutt," he said, and sneered at Jou, "You're here as well."

"Here?" Yami Yugi demanded. "Where is here?"

"The Middle Ages." The CEO shrugged. "To me it looks just like the Arthurian period in England."

"We've been transported...back in time?" the pharaoh said, still looking askance at him.

"Of course," Kaiba said dismissively, crossing his arms. "It's obvious. Look at the architecture...the clothes we're wearing..."

"Say what?" Yugi looked closer at Kaiba, realizing that he was wearing what appeared to be a long, high-collared tunic, and some sort of strange-looking pants.

And so were they.

"So...what happened over there?" Yami Yugi gestured to the left.

Kaiba sighed. "You won't believe it. The rest of them..."

"Our friends?" Yugi said hopefully.

"Not exactly," he muttered evasively. "That crazy white-haired boy who hangs out with you, and that other one with all the jewelry, and the one with the dice earring – "

Yugi and Jou groaned.

The CEO raised an eyebrow. "That's not the half of it. I haven't got my laptop, everyone seems to know my name but believes I've been living here all my life, and I asked someone what we were supposed to be doing and what we were here for an – "

"Whoa, slow down, Kaiba!" Jou said.

For once, Kaiba didn't take the chance to drop a dog comment. Instead he blinked, realizing that he'd been talking a mile a minute.

"So?" Jou prompted. "Who do they think we are?"

"Squires. Supposedly some knights will come around and choose squires from among us."

"Knights?" Yugi gulped. "As in...jousting? Lances?"

"Apparently." Kaiba nodded. "To prove that point further – look what I found in a pile of clothes under my bed."

He held up what was, unmistakably, a sword.