AUTHOR'S NOTE: Its been a while since I started this story, and I want to apologise to all those who have been waiting for this final update. So here it is at last people, the finale of my fanfic.

SILENT TALE Chapter 6 – Ben Warren

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Dante finished sorting through his deck and carefully placed the cards back into the Duel Plate, which snapped across his arm and formed a full playing mat in front of him in response to the activation. Sighing, he looked up at the sky and watched as the clouds above stone henge gathered and rain began to patter lightly onto the ground.

So this was the place he had seen in his vision. A spot where two vastly different worlds had momentarily connected once before, and where an ancient power was being housed. Now it seemed that the mystical power locked away within the ancient stones was in peril, Dartz would be sending his forces to destroy the stones as part of his own bid for power.

A bolt of lightening forked across the sky, and Dante peeled away the coat he had been wearing and tossed it away. Somewhere out there a great battle was being fort between the King of Games, Yugi and the man himself. That battle would decide the ultimate outcome of this secret war, but tonight in this place the only thing standing between victory or defeat was the young English champion.

He'd sent Tanya away with the crew of the aeroplane, under the pretence that she would have to take care of Bakura, who had used a lot of power in flight to save them and was now stuck in a deep sleep. They'd gone to the closest village and sought refuge like he told them, but not before she'd kissed him goodbye. He could still feel the heat from her lips on his if he thought about it. To his surprise he realised that this was something that had been building between them since they first met in the park back in America, and perhaps if he survived the night they'd take it further.

If he survived the night.

Out in the distance something stirred. He couldn't see them yet, but he knew that they were coming.

Dante's fingers fluttered through his deck and placed four warrior-type monsters onto the field. Shimmering with a faint haze they materialised around him, a routine of bodyguards. Then he played the Millennium Shield and Lightening Sword, equipping them onto himself and arming ready for battle. Night had fallen some time ago, and the moon cast an eerie glow over the surroundings.

Letting his gaze fall across the field, he saw a wave of monsters rise up and charge . . .

-----

Tanya sat beside the bedside of the young Japanese boy who was living a double life, she didn't understand much about what had been happening these past few days, but she knew that above all else Dante had wanted to keep the rarest card he owned from the hands of her former employer. Sponging Bakura's brow she settled back in her chair and reached into a pocket, sliding free the small piece of card that Dante had pressed into her hands before she had left, whilst they had kissed.

It was a Warrior-type monster, she knew that much. Tius the Holy Knight, Attack and defence were both marked at exactly 4000, and the special effect was to raise the attack of all warrior or spellcaster type cards currently in play by 1000 points. She didn't know what all the fuss was about, but looking at the card closely she thought that the hero depicted looked a little like Dante himself.

Closing her hand over the image, she hugged it to her chest and hoped that he was alright.

-----

Sliding through the mud, he parried an open thrust from an opponent and skewered the monster on the end of his blade, another tried to breathe fire over him but he jumped back with inches to spare and it only succeeded in scorching his right arm. Panting now, and almost out of breath, Dante surveyed the carnage. Twenty monsters had fallen under his blade at the last count, but his own warriors had all but been destroyed. One remained and he couldn't find a break in the combat long enough to summon more to the field. Unable to even finish that thought, he dived to one side and avoided a nasty axe that would have taken him out had his last monster not charged forward and taken the blow in his stead.

There were so many of them, an army of monsters that kept coming no matter how many he slew. A large creature that he didn't recognise gave him trouble for a moment, until he severed its neck with a well-timed blow and it shattered into pieces.

He was about to try and summon again, desperate for the aid now that he had to take the risk, when someone pushed him from behind and he fell into the mud. Rolling to his knees he spun around to see a girl with long purple hair, tied back into a ponytail carrying a scythe and garbed in a long trench coat. Strapped to one arm was what looked on first glance to be a Duel-plate, but on closer inspection it was a lot more streamlined in design and faintly organic. Now that plate was active and it glowed with a faint radiance that put Dante in mind of murky water.

"Dante." She smiled darkly and swung the scythe into a better position. "I said we'd meet again."

"Nadia." He grimaced, he'd been hoping that nobody human would be present. Killing monsters was one thing, but to kill another person . . . he wasn't sure if he could do such a thing, even if it was a choice between life and death.

She was leading the attack, he realised, her plate was shinning with enough light that she must be summoning every monster in the field. And here he was, all alone and without even a single warrior of his own to protect himself.

She brought the scythe around in a wide motion that shattered his Millennium Shield and pushed him further down into the mud. Rolling to his feet he used the sword to try and keep her away, but she continued to push her advantage further and further until his back hit one of the standing stones and suddenly there was nowhere left to run.

One blow knocked the sword from his hand and it shattered as it hit the ground, vanishing. Smiling, she brought the blade around for a second pass that would decapitate him, but just before it struck his neck a small furry creature appeared for a split second and took the brunt of the attack, shattering into pieces with a high pitched squeal. Nadia looked surprised, and faltered for a second, and Dante thanked god that he'd taken that one card from Tanya's collection back in her apartment in America.

Diving forwards, he tackled Nadia at the waist and they both went down, a fury of arms and legs as each tried to grapple the weapon away from the other. Using all his strength Dante ripped it from her fingers and pushed himself to his feet, the scythe poised to strike. One blow and he could finish it.

But he stopped, half way through the motion and gasped at what he had been about to do. Horrified with himself he threw the weapon aside and looked down at her.

"I can't do it. I can't take a life." He gasped for breath.

She stared up at him and was about to say something when her eyes bulged and she yelled "Look out!" as a roaring monster appeared behind him, one claw streaking towards him with enough might to reduce him to a smear in the mud. But something darted across the opening between the stones and cut the beast in half, stopping the roar mid-pitch and sending it into oblivion. Dante struggled to see through the half-light and the rain, but for a second he thought that he saw Black Luster Soldier smiling at him, and then he was gone again, back amidst the battle, cutting a path through the enemy.

Nadia got to her feet, and he turned to face her again. Reaching to her Duel-plate he braced himself for another monster or attack, but to his surprise she pulled it from her arm with considerable effort and threw it to the ground. There in the mud it sizzled nastily and remained.

"I'm through." She glared at him, and then she looked away in shame.

But the monsters didn't stop coming. Far from it, they appeared to double in size and number again and again until he was completely surrounded. Summoning one spell and trap after another Dante tried to keep them at bay, but nothing worked. Gripping Nadia's hand they retreated into the centre of the stones and braced themselves for their last stand.

"I don't see how the plate is still summoning. I took it off!" Nadia called through the rain, barely audible despite standing so close to him. "It shouldn't be able to do that!"

And neither did he. Summoning his last card, he handed her a Legendary Sword and the two watched as the monsters surged towards them through the night like some unstoppable wave.

-----

In the bedroom Tanya listened to the distant sounds of battle and the occasional sparks of light that flared through the window. Still holding the card close to her chest she felt tears running down her cheeks and realised she was crying for the first time since she was a little girl.

One of the windows began to rattle, but she took no notice of it, the wind was forceful with the storm.

She cried for Dante, wishing that he had stayed away, or that the two of them could have kept running. Things had seemed easier when they had been on the road. But at some point everyone had to stop running and face their fears.

She wiped her eyes with her sleeve and noticed that Tius was glowing.

With a suddenness that shocked her, the window blew open and the rain streamed in, followed by a blinding light that filled the room and pushed away the shadows of night. Standing so shocked, the card fell from her grasp and touched the floor, where it exploded into the shape of a man. Lifted off of her feet by invisible hands, she was held close to his face.

YOU HAVE A PURE HEART.

The voice was all around her, but it must have been coming from the man. She tried to back away but the hands held her and calmed her as best they could.

I WILL NOT HARM YOU. YOU WISH TO SAVE THE BOY.

She nodded and her hair bobbed around her face. Her wet cheeks felt ice cold.

THEN SAY MY NAME.

"Tius." She whispered to herself, and then in a stronger voice that filled the room, crammed with her hopes and her dreams she screamed it at the top of her lungs "Tius!"

-----

Nadia kicked away a demon and screamed as another raked a bloody gouge across her cheek. Unarmed, Dante darted forwards and physically pushed the thing from her, sending it stumbling back into the mass of writhing bodies that hissed and spat around them. At the centre of the standing stones there was roughly a meter of space around them, everything beyond that and as far as they eye could see was a mass of dark flesh.

He hoped that he'd brought Yugi enough time to do what had to be done. A few seconds more and there would be nothing standing between Dartz and the power hidden beneath Stone Henge.

Then suddenly world around Dante exploded into light so bright that he thought that the sun had risen. The monster closest to him opened its mouth to scream, then burst into a pillar of flame. Like lightening, the light bounced from monster to monster, frying them until at last there were none to be seen. For a moment he could have sworn that he saw the outline of a figure on the horizon, and then as the first rays of sunlight peeked over the horizon, he wrapped himself in a large cloak and vanished.

"The Holy Knight." He whispered, and looked at Nadia whose gaze was similarly riveted to the rising sun. The Duel-plate that she had discarded cracked and split, a sigh of escaping power echoed around the now deserted hillside, and the plate melted into slag.

She stepped away from him and began to cry. A strange sight considering that she had seemed such a violently strong woman, but then he realised that his eyes were filled with tears too. After everything that they had seen and done this night, maybe it was the best thing to do. Sitting in the grass he lay back against one of the stones and sprawled in the sunlight.

He didn't know anything for sure, but he felt deep down that it was over. Somewhere out there Yugi had defeated the mastermind behind all of this, and as for Dante's own small part in the drama, it was almost certain that he would at last be able to get the rest he so desperately wanted all of a sudden.

Something underneath him was making him uncomfortable, and he reached one hand around behind his head to feel the familiar shape of a card. Pulling it out he flipped it over and revealed the Black Luster Soldier. HIS card. The card that allowed him to overcome all obstacles in the greatest card game imaginable and no player had defeated him.

A slow smile spread across his face.

Maybe it wasn't over. After all, there was a future with Tanya to look forward to, and there was always that duel with Kaiba . . .