ONE CARD SHORT:

CHAPTER EIGHT - SILENCE ON THE OTHER END

"Did you call me ten times?"

Written by Gregory Smith

All characters portrayed within are copyright 1996 Kazuki Takahashi,

With the exception of Gradius, who is copyright 2003 Gregory Smith.

"Would you put that away, Anzu?" Jounouchi grumbled, as they slowly walked downtown, "He's not gonna pick up. He never does." Anzu sighed in reply, putting the phone into her purse. Jounouchi was right; Yugi would never pick up his cell phone. If he had something important to tell them, he'd call them. He wasn't going to call them ba—

Anzu's ringtone cut through the air like so many razor blades, and she quickly fumbled for her purse's zipper, trying to get the cell phone before Yugi hung up. After a few seconds, she managed to unzip the purse and extract the cell phone. Answering in a huff, she asked "Yugi? Is that you?"

The line was silent for a few seconds, but it sounded like Yugi was talking off to the side of the phone. Suddenly, he replied to Anzu.

"Did you call me ten times?"

"Yugi, we were—"

"Anzu! Ten times?"

"That's not important right now! Yugi, why's the sky purple all of the sudden?"

Subject-changer Anzu had won her first battle for the day, as the line fell silent again. On the other end, she heard shouting, then faint whispering.

"Are Jounouchi and Honda with you?"

"Yeah, they are." Anzu turned and looked to the two boys with a "he asked if you were with me" look. The two dumbly returned with a "why the hell is he asking about us?" look, performed in perfect unison.

Silence on the other end reigned supreme. Was Yugi confirming all of this with someone?

"Come to the museum, and bring them with you! This concerns them, too!"

"Yugi, wait! What's going—"

"I'll explain later!"

There was a quiet popping noise, and then the line fell silent for the last time. Anzu turned and looked at Jounouchi and Honda. "It looks like we're going to the museum," she said, putting her cell phone back into her purse. Jounouchi and Honda turned and looked at each other with serious faces; they didn't like where this was all headed.