Chapter 6- In fear of a card
The announcer looked his sheet of paper over and yelled, "Will Daniel Pilkington and Tiamat please come to the arena?"
Daniel was already in the ring, so now he just needed wait for his opponent. Unfortunately he didn't know anything about Tiamat, though by the name he assumed he would be facing a dragon deck.
A woman dressed in an ornate suit of armor that made her resemble a humanoid version of the famous Blue-eyes White Dragon sauntered down into the ring. While Daniel couldn't see her face very well thanks to her armor, he could see her figure. ("And what a pleasant figure it is.") He couldn't help but whistle slightly as he looked over her tall and shapely frame.
She snorted derisively at his reaction to her and said, "So you are Daniel Pilkington? I expected a more impressive specimen."
Daniel blushed fiercely at that, his cheeks burning red. "Hey!"
("Quite the ladies man, aren't you?")
("SHUT UP!")
Daniel had just gone from embarrassed straight into angry. "I'll show you impressive. Just watch as my machines tear your dragons to shreds!" His duel disk clicked into place and his life point counter lit up.
She snorted haughtily, in a way that reminded Daniel of how Commander had talked to CJ before. "I very much doubt that you are going to be able to touch my life points, much less take out my best dragons." Her duel disk clicked into place as well.
The announcer yelled into his microphone, "Begin the duel!"
Daniel drew his five card hand and then his sixth card. He shuffled his hand around to see if any combos leapt out at him. Every time he looked upon the Jinzo card in his hand though he felt his blood run cold and shivers run up and down his spine. He didn't know what was causing this fear of his favorite card, but he shook his head to clear it. He was in the middle of a duel. ("Not now....not now....") He slapped down a monster. "Try this. I summon Reflect Bounder (1700/1000) in attack mode." A machine monster made of mirrors appeared on the field before him. "Now I'll set two cards face-down and end my turn."
Tiamat drew and set a monster face-down. "End turn."
Daniel drew and slid his Reflect Bounder into the graveyard slot on his disk. ("Time to get you where you belong Jinzo.")
"I summon Jinzo!" Nothing happened.
"Err....I summon Jinzo." Still nothing happened.
Daniel grimaced and slid Jinzo into the graveyard. He had just wasted his summon and now his favorite card was in the graveyard, plus he had no monsters on the field to defend him. ("I'm not beaten yet.") "End turn."
Tiamat cackled from underneath her helmet. "Having problems with your machines little boy? Let me end this so you can go and take them in for a tune-up. I flip up my face-down monster card Luster Dragon (1900/1700) into attack mode." A large dragon appeared that was covered in a hard cover of sapphires.
She pulled a card from her hand and slid it into her disk. "Now I activate the magic card Stamping Destruction. This will destroy one face-down magic/trap card on the field and deal you 500 life points of damage." The Luster Dragon screeched and flew over to Daniel's field, shattering on his face-down cards with a tackle.
Daniel- 7500
Tiamat- 8000
Daniel growled and slid his Negate Attack trap into the graveyard. ("Not good. That was my defense card.")
Tiamat daintily played another monster on her field. "I summon another Luster Dragon in attack mode." Another sapphire dragon joined the first and both dragons screeched at Daniel. "Now I order them both to attack!" The two dragons flew across the field and slammed right into Daniel, knocking him off his feet.
Daniel- 3700
Tiamat- 8000
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CJ and Deondre were already in their seats, both of them sporting quite a few painful bruises from their fight.
Deondre scratched at his chin as he looked at Daniel's field. "Is it just me or did Daniel somehow not successfully summon Jinzo?"
Allon, Janeam and CJ all nodded.
Deondre sighed in confusion. "That's not supposed to happen. You can't fail at summoning a monster in this game."
CJ grimaced. "Well whether we accept it or not doesn't matter. He couldn't summon Jinzo and that's all there is to it."
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Slowly pulling himself back to his feet, Daniel drew his next card. "I'll get you back for that one." He frowned at his hand. ("Big talk but can I back it up. I'm holding nothing tough enough to hurt those dragons of hers.")
("Your other face-down?")
Daniel slapped himself in the head and whispered, "Duh." ("Wait, did I just get help from the voice in my head?")
He realized now was not the time to argue against clever advice. "Alright. I reveal my face-down card, Rise of the Machines! This will allow me to summon one machine monster from my graveyard for every turn I have spent not attacking you. Since it has only been one turn since Rise of the Machines has been out, I now revive Jinzo!" Just like before when he tried to summon Jinzo, nothing happened. ("Damn it,")
"I choose to revive Reflect Bounder instead!" The mirror monster reappeared on the field. "Next I'll set one card face-down and play the magic card Machine Conversion Facility, raising Reflect Bounder's attack points by 300. (2000/1300) "Reflect Bounder will attack one of your dragons!" Reflect Bounder gathered energy around its mirrors and fired a blast of light across the field, consuming one of Tiamat's Luster Dragons.
Daniel- 3700
Tiamat- 7900
Daniel frowned down at his graveyard and the dead card that sat in it. "End turn."
Tiamat drew and cackled once more. "Prepare to lose boy. I summon Lord of Dragons (1200/1000) in attack mode." A man in dragon bone armor appeared on the field next to the Luster Dragon. "Now I play Flute of Summoning Dragons. This card will allow me to summon two dragons from my hand to the field!" A golden flute shaped like a dragon's head floated down and landed into the Lord of Dragons hands. He blew into it and she threw two monsters onto her duel disk. "Now I shall call upon my Luster Dragon #2 (2400/1400) and my most powerful beast, Tyrant Dragon! (2900/2300)" A huge dragon covered in emerald armoring appeared on one end of her field, and an even bigger dragon with brown scales appeared on the other side of her field. They both roared and the sheer force of their cries nearly threw Daniel off his feet.
Tiamat laughed haughtily and pointed at Daniel. "Now Tyrant Dragon attack his Reflect Bounder!" The enormous brown dragon released a burst of flames at Daniel's mirror monster.
Daniel smiled. "Bad move! I reveal my face-down magic card, Limiter Removal! It'll double the attack power of my Reflect Bounder. (4000/1300) And thanks to his special ability you take your monsters attack points in damage anyway, so therefore you just lost 4000 life points!" Reflect Bounder caught the flames and bounced them back at the Tyrant Dragon, destroying it instantly.
Daniel- 3700
Tiamat- 4000
Tiamat set one card face-down. "End turn."
Daniel drew and watched as his over-loaded Reflect Bounder exploded, leaving his field empty.
Tiamat decided to rub in her current advantage. "So what can you do with the two cards in your hand?"
Daniel bit his lower lip. He knew there was a way to win, but it required he summoned Jinzo. Considering how successful his last two attempts had been at summoning his favorite monster, he wasn't sure he could do it.
He had to ask himself the big question though, ("Why?")
Why was Jinzo not summoning itself? It could be something wrong with the duel disk, but Daniel knew better than to think that. It had handled every other card fine up until he tried to summon Jinzo. He sighed and took a deep breath. ("Jinzo, whatever I have done to offend you, forgive me.") "Prepare to meet defeat Tiamat! First I'll play Monster Reborn and attempt to revive Jinzo from the card graveyard!"
At first nothing happened, but then ever so slowly Jinzo (2400/1500) started to materialize on Daniel's field. Crossing its metal arms across his chest, Jinzo looked to its master for orders.
Daniel felt the stress of not having his favorite monster to back him up fade away. "Thank you Jinzo," he whispered.
"Can we please get on with this!?" Screamed Tiamat.
Daniel smiled and slid his other card into his duel disk. "In a hurry to lose? Fine with me. I set one card face-down on the field and I'll have Jinzo attack your Lord of Dragons." Jinzo built up the energy for its attack and released a pulsing ball of darkness that consumed the Lord of Dragons.
Daniel- 3700
Tiamat- 2800
Daniel smiled and took a deep breath, feeling better by the second now that his favorite monster was back. "End turn."
Tiamat drew. "I'll suicide my Luster Dragon #2 into your Jinzo!" The emerald encrusted dragon shot across the field and slammed into Jinzo, both monsters disappearing in a flash of flame.
Tiamat cackled once more. "Now my Luster Dragon will attack your life points! So much for your little Jinzo!" The Luster Dragon screeched and went into a dive right at Daniel.
Smiling, Daniel pressed a button on his duel disk. "Wrong move. Since you have declared your attack I will trigger my trap card. Reveal Call of the Haunted. This trap card allows me to revive one monster from my graveyard in attack mode. I'll give you one guess who I'll revive."
Tiamat gasped. "Oh no!"
Daniel chuckled as the Luster Dragon was destroyed by a blast of darkness energy from under the earth. Then slowly Jinzo rose up from the ground, chuckling.
Daniel- 3700
Tiamat- 2300
Tiamat looked at Jinzo and then looked at her hand. She sighed sadly. "I...have no monsters in my hand that I can summon. And since your Jinzo negates all trap cards the other cards in my hand won't help me either. I surrender."
The field flickered and then faded, with Daniel giving Jinzo one more thankful look. He removed the Jinzo card from his disk and smiled at it. "We're a team then?" He already knew the answer.
Shuffling his cards together he walked over and smirked at Tiamat. "Wanna insult my machines again?"
Tiamat bowed her head. "My apologies for under-estimating your skill. Farewell." She turned and sauntered off, in almost the same way she arrived.
Daniel looked up at the stands and nodded slightly to Deondre, who nodded back. "You and me then Deondre! The winner gets the pack and bragging rights!"
Deondre walked slowly down the stairs and nodded. "I wouldn't have it any other way."
The two faced off from each other and their duel disks clicked into place. They both smiled as they drew their five. For a moment silence reigned over the field, and then finally both duelists broke it with a cry of, "LET'S DUEL!"
To be continued...
Next Chapter: The end of the PQ tournament
Author's notes: Just wanted to thank everyone who has been reading this little old fanfiction of mine. On that note, I'm going to need a whole lot of characters for the Shadow Corporation tournament. So please if you have a character who is a duelist in mind please let me know about them! The tournament itself will be over 200 players in the beginning.