Disclaimer: Don't own YGO, can't even write duels…
Inwe: I think excuses are in order!
1. I can't really write sad scenes
2. I lost… (well, my mum did) my thumb drive… xD And this is saved there!
3. I went on a holiday! Yay! Back to Queensland! Because last time I went there I broke my leg…
4. I couldn't be bothered to look for my thumb drive.
5. I went over my Broadband storage limit… so my computer's working way too slow. And NO it was NOT because I was downloading clips from the OC… hehe…
6. My yearly exams are just finished, (yes, in Australia it's the END of the school year! YAY!) And I study too hard when they come up… :D
See? I always come prepared! THANKYOU to all who reviewed! I love you all!
Chapter 9: Disruptions in the System
Yami had run, Téa had run.
The rest of the gang were still staring at each other. They were obviously all experiencing a kind of delayed reaction.
Surprisingly it was Bakura that spoke up first, "Um, shouldn't we see what the problem is?"
Everyone jumped at the unexpected sound of Bakura's voice. Joey nodded. "I guess we should, Téa might be sick or something…"
There was another long silence. They were all remembering the hysterical state Téa had been when she had told everyone about the screaming. The virtual world did do something to people… Téa could have been the first on to crack…
Yugi shook his head impatiently. Were the others dense or something? Two of their friends were possibly in danger, one his other half, and the other a friend he had known for years. And the rest of them were standing motionless, as if they still hadn't realised what was going on.
"Aren't we going to help them?" Yugi cried out, exasperatedly.
"Right!" Tristan shouted, shaking his head to clear it.
They all started to sprint in the direction Yami and Téa had run off in.
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Yami was staring at the dark, damp hole that Téa had disappeared through. How could a person be there one moment and be gone the next? Had Téa met the same fate as the one who she had heard scream? If she had actually heard something, he reminded himself.
He was still breathing hard, and his usually strategic mind was struggling to come to grips with what had just happened. His chest felt incredibly tight, and he could hear his heart beating faster and faster, getting so fast it felt like it could explode.
Yami felt something damp fall down his cheek and lifted his hand to wipe it away impatiently. He assumed it had fallen from one of the stalactites dangling above his head. Startlingly the water droplet was warm, nothing like the freezing cold, milky water that was falling from above him.
So where could it have come from then?
He felt another wet object slide down his face again, leaving a long damp trail down his cheek. He traced the trail up his face until he reached its place of origin, his eye. But he couldn't be… crying, could he? Spirits can't cry, he told himself viciously.
But then again, was he still a spirit? Sure, he had his own body now, but what if it was just an illusion conjured up by Craine? Would he still have his own body after… if they ever got out?
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Craine laughed again, stretching his arms tiredly in his chair. He had stayed awake for the past two days, watching the teens' progress on the screen. Occasionally, Jonothan would come in, and give him a report on how the other duelists were faring in their more 'normal' Virtual Reality world. The most intriguing team of all was definitely Seto Kaiba's team. Apparently, he had almost figured out a way to escape from the world without even meeting the requirements of the game.
Who knows how he'd managed to get his laptop in there?
After Seto's plan had failed, (due to some very quick thinking by Jonothan) he had consoled himself by beating as many duelists as was humanly possible (though - even though Seto would hate to hear it - Yami could probably have done better) in a short space of time. And even though he hadn't quite figured out a way to get out of the accursed world, he had managed to leave a rather charming message on Craine's computer.
One problem stood before Craine and getting what he wanted.
The good side of him. What was originally the only side to Craine.
The weak old fool could somehow fight against the holds Craine would place on him.
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Yami rose quickly, blinking furiously. He turned to see the rest of the gang out of breath and looking at him quizzically.
"Where's Tea?" they all queried, their heads all tilted to one side.
Yami stared at them, feeling the panic rise up in him again. The panic seemed to course through his entire body, starting first and his feet, and rising steadily up through the tips of his hair. How could he tell them? It was… his fault. He spoke, his voice catching in his throat, "Tea… she, she… fell."
The words seemed to burn through the silence, they seemed to echo in everyone's minds again and again. To Yami, voicing the words seemed to make the whole thing ten times more horrible, more real. He shook his head violently, looking almost desperately back at the others, hoping that they would be able to think of a way to get her back.
"WHAT!?" Joey burst out, disbelief etched all over his face.
Yami didn't speak, but that familiar rage was slowly seeping into his system again. But instead of it being directed at the person that had landed them all here, it was at his own friends for being so ignorant.
He shook himself. He shouldn't get mad at his own friends, that would make things much worse. As he had said to Kaiba during that duel back in Battle City, anger never gets you anywhere. And how were they to know what had happened to Téa?
He steadied himself and tried to talk it through calmly.
"After I had followed Téa for a time, she stopped. I'm not quite sure how it happened, but suddenly… ground seemed to disappear, and Téa fell," he said, his voice wavering slightly.
"And I could have saved her…" he said suddenly, "I could have saved her, if I hadn't hesitated, she wouldn't have fallen… it's my fault…"
He looked down at his feet, feeling helpless for the first time since he had emerged from the Millennium Puzzle. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Joey glancing at Mai without saying anything, when he thought no one was watching.
Was this how Joey had felt when Marik trapped Mai's mind in the Shadow Realm while Joey stood helpless beside her?
Having his own body was too tiresome. All the emotions he had experienced before seemed shadows of the emotions you could experience in your own body. Yami had forgotten what it had been like, all those years ago, to have your own body.
The others were silent, and looking at Yami in a kind of astonishment. He was so different now!
"Then we have to save her!" Yugi said determinedly.
"We what?" Yami questioned, looking up.
"Téa. We need to save her. We can't waste any more time!" Tristan said.
"Right." Joey stated.
"And we'll do it together?" Serenity asked, looking around at them all.
"Of course. Together." Yugi said, smiling.
Yami nodded, together they would find Téa.
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A tiny Kuriboh leapt from its perch on one of the high branches of an old weeping willow tree. The glen in which the tree was placed was one of the few places Craine had bothered to program in Duel Monsters. The only monsters that occupied the place were monsters like Kuriboh, small and insignificant ones, programmed there merely because Craine could.
Its wide eyes observed the glen in front of him. The creature had heard a noise, and being the curious type, jumped down from its branch to see what was amiss. What he saw was beyond what the tiny little creature could comprehend. Something lay there, on a pile of leaves, was something much larger than anything he had ever seen before.
Téa.
Of course the creature couldn't know that it was Téa, it had never seen a human in its virtual life. It hopped bravely towards the pile of leaves, its head turning this way and that, his ears pricked for any sign of danger. The figure on the leaves groaned softly and shifted very slightly.
The Kuriboh jumped back in alarm as Téa stirred.
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Craine stretched and yawned. Spending two whole days in the same chair really took it out of you. He observed the monitors in front of him. One showed the gang out in the sunlight, looking very confused. A second showed a shot of a glen filled with duel monsters and one teenage girl. Suddenly, he frowned. The girl was stirring.
"No! She's not supposed to wake up yet!" he growled to himself, "This isn't right…"
He tapped his fingers on the desk. He stared at the screen, willing an explanation to just appear in his head. Then slowly a realisation dawned on him.
"The only thing that could break her sleep would be-" Craine slammed his fist on the table in frustration, "Impossible. Not like that."
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The gang was outside the cave, blinking in the sunlight. They had gotten nowhere. Logically, Téa would have to be far underground if she had fallen through a hole in a cave. Logically. But the whole gang very much doubted that this place was anywhere near logical, especially since a seemingly mad old man had created it.
"How do we get underground, big brother?" Serenity said, blinking up at Joey.
Joey's forehead creased as he made an effort to think hard. "I… dunno, Seren. But we'd better find Téa soon…"
Yami felt like just falling on the ground and dig as far down as he could with his bare hands. But he knew that would be an absolutely crazy thing to do, and it would make him look like a stupid, weak fool.
"Look," Yugi said, pointing up above the cave entrance, "There could be a way down from up there.
"Yugi," Tristan said, snorting, "We want to go up, not down."
"I know that! I just think that there might be a way down. I mean, from up there there could be another way down. It's worth a try, isn't it?"
Yami nodded quickly. "It is. We can't waste anymore time."
"Excuse me, Yugi? Do any of you have any plans to actually get up there?" Mai said in disbelief, "There's no easy way up there and…"
But all the guys had already started climbing. Mai folded her arms.
"C'mon Mai!" Joey shouted from about two metres up the wall, "It's not dat far up! Only abou' 5 metres!"
Mai sighed. Was there anything worse than being stuck with the knucklehead for two days? And maybe even longer than that? She thought not. But if everyone else was going…
Mai walked towards the wall and looked up. She'd kill Joey when she got to the top.
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"Where am I?" Téa muttered, sitting up. Her head was throbbing and her left leg was aching. But at the moment she was more worried about being stuck in the middle of nowhere with no idea where she was.
"How did I get here…?" she continued, trying to stand up. Her leg buckled beneath her weight and she lurched sideways. Her arms flailed desperately about until she caught hold of a sturdy tree branch. She growled in frustration and sat heavily back down on the leaves. She had a fleeting memory of someone's hand and then… blackness… Then she remembered… a voice calling out to her, saying her name. That was it.
"Well, it can't get any worse than this," she frowned. She took another look at her surroundings. It was Yami, Yami that had saved her. In another situation she would have been ecstatic. But the fall seemed to have sapped the life out of her. It felt like everything inside of her was just a big, black pit, like the one she had fallen into earlier. How could Craine do that?
The shadow realm could, a voice whispered inside her head.
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Mai and Serenity's shrieking echoed down the passageway. The way down was dark, black and slippery, so consequently instead of walking downwards, the gang was sliding its way down the passage. They crashed hard into hard rock, slid over pebbles and the whole experience was very painful. And to Mai's absolute disgust, their clothes were dirty. Very dirty.
They had been sliding for 10 minutes, going deeper and deeper and deeper. None of them would be surprised if they found themselves on the other side of the world again, they were going so deep. Suddenly, after what seemed like forever, Yami (who was leading) saw a breathtaking, awesome, incredible sight. Light. At the end of the tunnel.
"We're nearly there!" he cried.
The gang gave weak, exhausted cheers.
Yami felt himself painfully to the bottom of the passageway and blinked as he found himself in a leafy, bright, green glen.
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Inwe: I know… that wasn't such a good chapter… Well, it's not too bad… right? ::weak smile:: Um, soon the others will leave the Virtual World so there'll be time for a lot more romance. Right now there's not all that much. Review! (Just 8 reviews to go! Yay!)
