Disclaimer: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh!
Chapter 7: Jailbreak! Part 3: Magical Hats
Celton walked cautiously through the maze, looking around every corner. He no longer had his staff with him, and it seemed to have stripped his strength away. Besides that, the sucking of power he had gotten from the fight with the Wall Shadow didn't help.
So let's see here, I have to help find Hufanse, Aundren, and Svrion. I hope they all aren't split. Or, the Labyrinth Tanks haven't gotten to them. They sound like troublemakers to me. Especially the Dark Warriors. I don't trust them. I don't understand how Cy can.
Celton sighed as he turned left, walking right into a dead end. Celton shook his head. This was starting to get frustrating and rather pointless.
Suddenly he heard voices. No, not in his head. Even though, someone in his position was likely to suffer from such a case and eventually go mental. However, these voices were indeed real to the world. They seemed to be coming from the opposite side of the wall.
Of course, Celton didn't need to worry. First of all, it couldn't be a Tank or a Ghoul cause they didn't talk. Second, the language was his own and so it had to be someone familiar. And third, even if it was a dangerous person, they couldn't possibly come through the wall.
Right?
Right… that's why two young adults literally landed on Celton's feet straight through the wall. Celton was thinking: What the hell?
"I told you! Fake walls do exist." Now, wasn't that obvious?
"Well, gee, sorry if I accidentally decided that the rules of nature apply here."
"Rules of nature? What in the world are you talking about? What rules of nature?"
"You know, the rule that says you can't pass through solid objects?"
"Does the wall look solid to you?"
"It looks solid enough!"
"You guys, what are you doing?" At that moment, the two young men stopped quarreling and looked up at the almost Dark Magician above them. They gasped. Celton raised his eyebrows. Before he could say another word, though, they jumped to the ground and aimed dark energy strings at him.
"Whoa! Whoa! What did I do?"
"Don't be a kidder, Juoro. We know it's you. Nice disguise, though. I never thought you would assume that of a Dark Magician, a kind that you despise with all your heart. If you had one!" You guys are probably all baffled why Juoro was dragged in here, and so was Celton cause he had never heard of such a name in his life!
"Excuse me, but I am here to rescue you. If you two are Aundren and Hufanse like I presume. After all, the other prisoners have died already. Anyway, my name is Celton, not Juoro, and I want to help you."
"Nice try! Okay then, if 'Celton' is how you want to be called then so be it. But you won't trick us!"
"Hufanse! Aundren! I'm trying to help you. I'm on your side. Cy is on your side. We are-,"
"Whoa! Did you say…C…C…Cy?"
"Okay, now Hufanse, get a…"
"Shut up, Aundren! He said Cy! He said Cy! Oh my gosh! She's HERE?"
"Apparently you know her…"
"Where? Where is she? Is she okay? How is she doing?"
"Okay. Well, Celton, Juoro. Whoever you are, you must havefigured out by now he has a huge crush on her." Celton sweat-dropped.
"Like that wasn't obvious." We totally agree. Anyway, the three managed to convince each other – don't ask why – with that mere mention of Cy that they were each sincere in what they were saying. The truth discovered, and hopefully accepted, the three got together to hatch a plan.
"Okay, here's the deal…" Celton started. "There are five of us in this dungeon, plus an assortment of creatures that want to kill us. Since the three of us are here, obviously Cy and Svrion are somewhere else. Now, we have to find them. If they are together, it won't be quite as hard as if they are alone."
"Exactly," Hufanse agreed. "If they are separate, it will take longer to find one and then the other."
"But, on the contrary, if they are separate, we have more of a chance of finding one because we have two possible locations, not just one, and therefore more of the labyrinth is our target. The hit percentage is doubled."
"Shut up, Aundren. You're confusing me."
"The point is, we must stay together to avoid further division and see if anything besides aimless roaming will get us anywhere." Aundren looked over at Hufanse with a hesitant expression.
"I did understand that, thank you very much. But the question still remains, how are we going to do that?"
………
Cy covered her face as the stream of bolts from the Tanks rushed toward her. They didn't make it. All of a sudden, a wall rose up in front of her, the wall behind her vanished, and all around the labyrinth shifted. Cy breathed a sigh of relief.
"I hope you're happy I did that! If I hadn't found out the rare spots of weakness in this place, you would have been fried." Cy's heart lurched as she slowly turned to look at the speaker behind her. A tall teenager with purple hair and dark eyes met her. Cy was rendered speechless, except for a name she managed to utter.
"S…Sv…Sv…Svri…Svrion?" A pin drop could have been heard in the silence that enveloped them. Cy glanced over at her classmate with a relieved stare while he coolly glared upon her. Perhaps Cy missed that as she raced over and almost jumped into his arms.
"You're OKAY!" she cried, nearly bursting into tears. But Svrion just firmly grabbed her shoulders and pulled her away from him.
"How could you? I never thought you would! Cy, how dare you tell?" Cy was shocked for a few seconds before she also gripped Svrion's forearms.
"Oh my gosh! Svrion! Please, try to understand! It's all a mistake! I didn't do it!"
"Don't try to fool me! You betrayed me and your promise!"
"Honest I didn't…I…I…"
"You promised, and you dare give away their location. I trusted you!" Now if the words he wasn't saying weren't hurting enough, Svrion raised his voice slowly till it nearly became a shout. Cy's protests also grew in volume till they both yelled at each other as if they were oceans apart.
"I wasn't trying to hurt them!"
"You did a bloody good job of it!"
"Now you watch it! It's not as if no one has betrayed you ever. And for the last time I didn't tell."
"Don't fool me! You are the only one besides me that knew! If they got it from the 'anonymous' source, then it HAD to have been you!"
"Okay, so maybe I accidentally…"
"I knew it! You did tip it off to those bastards of Magic Swordsmen-," Cy couldn't take it anymore. She slapped Svrion's cheek as hard as she could. Surprised, he grabbed his throbbing face and stared in her direction in disbelief as she glared back.
"Don't you DARE insult my FATHER!" Svrion slowly shook his head. Cy gave a satisfied smirk. The guy was now shaking in his boots… great, she felt powerful!
Then perhaps in the next sentence I shouldn't mention that he was only staring in her general direction and therefore was actually not looking at her. Something else caught his attention and it was not good. That's what was making him shake.
"Um…" Svrion stuttered, gulping, his eyes wide and glued to Cy's direction. "I'm sorry that I yelled…at…you…and since this is…probably…the last…thing…I will…say please… forgive me…" Cy raised her eyebrows.
"What the heck are you mumbling about?" Svrion didn't respond with words. Instead, he took the hand that was not pointing past her head to grab her chin and turn it to look behind her. Lo and behold! The entire Labyrinth's Army had surrounded them. Not good…
"Looks like…" Cy said, her voice now identical to Svrion's and her expression as well. "Looks like…I should…be sorry…too…but…not for the…slap…cause you…deserve it…but…for…yelling… and attracting…the Tanks…" At the end of the sentence, she started to back up till she stepped on Svrion, who also began to backtrack. The tanks, their red drills flashing, slowly advanced.
"Perhaps…" Svrion continued, his voice now sounding unusually high, "I should…offer some…advice…"
"What's…that…?" Svrion stopped and so did Cy. The Tanks stopped and powered up.
"RUN!" Svrion grabbed Cy's hand and bolted into the nearest pathway. Yelling and gasping, she was forced to follow him as the two ran for it. Poor children! Will they ever learn? Two teenagers couldn't possibly escape a hundred Tanks driving at top speed.
They tried anyway.
………
Celton, Hufanse, and Aundren stared at each other as they sat cross-legged in a triangular circle in the middle of the path. And of course, taking caution, it was on the same square.
"So…two teenagers to find…" Hufanse sighed. "How are we ever going to do this?"
"Let usthink logically…" Aundren suggested. Hufanse glared at him.
"Logic? LOGIC? How can you have logic in a labyrinth! It's totally random! The probability of picking the same path they are on is one in a gazillion. And reasoning isn't going to get us anywhere because teenagers aren't going to use it, so there's no point in us using it."
"I meant, magic wise. I have already given up on the possibility that we will chance to pick the path which our comrades tread upon…" Hufanse raised an eyebrow.
"Comrades? Now you are making me feel guilty." Celton, who had resisted the urge to join the banter, finally decided that it was time to step in.
"True, my friends…" he paused there realizing he had used the word in a weird situation. "True, you two… magic would be a much better solution than…" Celton stopped again. Something was bothering him this time. Aundren and Hufanse must have felt it too because they started to gaze around.
"Strange…" Aundren whispered. "A force in the air, a magic released…a secret revealed…"
"Translation…?" Hufanse queried.
"Something ishappening." Aundren was right. The next second, the walls around them vanished and reappeared farther off. The entire path shifted, and the straight became the twisted. Celton narrowed his eyes.
"There was no tremor…this is not an ordinary Magical Labyrinth." With the shifting of a long stretch of the left wall, the Magical Labyrinth stopped. However, Celton, Aundren, and Hufanse were not convinced that the danger had passed.
"This," Celton said, "is making me suspicious. How can the Labyrinth change without the earthquake episode in the beginning?"
"Like I said," Aundren replied. "A secret revealed… do you not know? The Labyrinth's weakness consists of a pattern of several walls that run throughout the maze. When all are felt in spirit and imagined in the heart, you can command anything of the Labyrinth." Hufanse raised his eyebrows and backed up a step.
"That is damn weird!"
"I didn't make it up, if you by chance wonder. I read it somewhere in a poem, as always. The poem was based upon the art of interpretation, using the Labyrinth as a topic."
"A skill I do not have…"
"Oh Hufanse. I assure you that you possess the skill to decipher the meaning of that poem." Celton stepped between the two.
"You guys… chill. The poem is not what matters here…Hufanse, what are you staring at?" Celton and Aundren both looked at the Lord of Dragons as he turned and tried to look over the top of one of the walls. He turned around and pointed his thumb at the place he was staring at.
"Did you hear that?" he queried. Celton narrowed his eyes and walked up to the wall.
"What did you hear?"
"Sounded like a load of crap to me… and something about someone's father being insulted… something was bloody before that…a magic swordsman… something like that…" Aundren shrugged.
"An item of your imagination."
"Are you suggesting that I am hearing voices in my head?"
"No…are you suggesting that that's what I am suggesting?"
"Aundren…Hufanse…will you two EVER shut up?" Hufanse bit his lip and Aundren shook his head to clear the bangs from his eyes. "I figured out something while you two were randomly talking… there are only two other people alive in this Labyrinth. They must have been the ones talking! Guys! It's Cy and Svrion!"
"But exactly where are they?" Hufanse asked. Aundren shrugged.
"Ask the Labyrinth. A wall for the predator, a wall for the prey, a wall for those who don't wish to stay."
"Okay, right about now, rhymes are starting to bug me…"
"A triangle!" Celton suddenly shouted out. "I get it! It's the same reasoning I learned behind Magical Hats." Hufanse looked bitterly confused and Aundren nodded triumphantly. Then, something else caught their attention.
"RUN!" Celton, Aundren, and Hufanse spun around. As quick as the voice had been heard, it vanished among the walls.
"I think we better figure out this mystery soon," Hufanse informed. "If that's Cy, she's in danger!" Celton nodded.
"Okay, here's the deal. Magical Hats uses four hats. Three of the hats are decoys and the fourth is the one that protects. The decoys form a triangle barrier around the real hat. Don't you notice the earlier poem thing that didn't rhyme? When all are felt in spirit and imagined in the heart, you can command anything of the Labyrinth. It's the same idea. Take the wall near the predator, the wall near the prey, and the wall near others who don't want to stay. The three will form a triangle…"
"Which represents something?" Hufanse questioned.
"Duh! Three, dude, three! The three Realms…the three worlds…the three God Monsters…the symbol of protection and stuff…"
"OH! I get it!"
"And Magical Hats! That's been the answer to our problem all along! That's the perfect way to save Cy and Svrion. The Magical Hats tutor I had always told me to feel the environment before the attack. Everything ties in now!"
"And…" Aundren added. "There are three of us! Let us do this and save our friends from those who wish to harm them." Celton nodded.
"Okay form a triangle!" Aundren and Hufanse – whether he finally got it or not – stood in front of Celton, and the three stood in a small triangle. Each closed his eyes. For a moment, the only sound in the entire Labyrinth was a small rumbling noise that sounded like a bunch of machines rolling across a floor. Three guesses what that might be…
"Okay," Celton muttered, barely daring to breathe in order to keep his concentration. "I invoke the power of the Labyrinth environment. I feel the power of the wall of the prey…" Celton actually had no idea if he was doing it right. But it seemed like one of those climatic and dramatic scenes in movies where the hero closes his eyes and does some magical things by "feeling the power". Okay, whatever. The main thing is, in his head he imagined Cy and Svrion running behind some green glowing wall. Okay…
"I invoke the power of the Labyrinth environment," chanted Aundren, continuing the ritual. "I feel the power of the wall of the predator…" He imagined giant Tanks and Ghouls chasing as the wall behind them glowed blue.
"I invoke the power of the Labyrinth environment," Hufanse repeated. "I feel the power of the wall…of the…people…who…don't wish…to stay? Okay, I feel the power of our wall!" Despite his hesitation, the spell thing must've worked. Celton felt this surge of power shoot through his body.
Magical Hats, he commanded in his head…oh no, I need a base…crap, how am I going to connect one? Cy, how can I connect to Cy? The staff…the staff…feel my power…I call upon Magical Hats. Celton shivered as power surged outward in a triangular motion, sweeping the entire dungeon. Hufanse grabbed his brown flowing cape to keep it from flying away. Soon darkness poured over the entire scene.
"This is creepy," Hufanse said as the world turned dark around them. Suddenly, the wall behind him turned a fiery red and shot out rays. In the distance, green and blue walls glowed back furiously. Golden waves connected the three walls and a rainbow tower of magic rose up. Hufanse, Aundren, and Celton shielded themselves as a bright light rushed into their eyes. To top it off, a hat of black velvet – yes, as crazy as it seems – surrounded them and they lost conscious…
………
Cy…Svrion…now where were we? Hm…fighting, slapping, running… ah, yes. They were trying to outrun the Labyrinth Tanks. Keyword: trying. I'm not saying they got very far. In fact, at this moment, the two of them are cornered at a dead end that is not a fake wall and have nowhere to go. They could use a rescue right about now.
"Crap…we are screwed!" Svrion growled, looking up to see if he could possibly climb up.
"My staff can't get all of them!" Cy cried, holding up her staff in front of her to prove it. It seriously wasn't helping them. Svrion sighed.
"It was nice knowing you," he said. "But, it doesn't look like we're going to survive this!" It wasn't that hard to notice the point. The two had nowhere to run, and about fifty Tanks had cornered them. And now, their red drills were charging their purple power. Svrion gulped.
"Well…let's hope something…strange happens…" Cy wished.
"Cy. I will kiss you if we get out of here!" Cy backed up as the Tanks aimed at their target. The two pressed up against the wall.
"Really? Well, I'll look forward to that then…until then… this is gonna hurt!" Cy buried her face in Svrion's shoulder, who held her as if he was some brave hero. But really, he felt like screaming. The Tanks zeroed in on their target. The end was near…
Or was it? Now that's a stupid question. Of course it wasn't. The wall behind Svrion suddenly started to glow bright green. Svrion raised his eyebrows. For some reason he could not explain, he felt like reaching out and touching the wall. Not with his hands, but with his heart. That was a weird feeling. He snaked his arms around Cy's shoulders to get a grip on himself.
Svrion looked down as he heard Cy gasp. In her hands, her staff lit up into a bright purple light. The whole thing resonated in power. Then, the power spread to the two of them. Wind howled through the walls and the Tanks lost their charged up power. And then, the world grew dark.
"Can you see anything?" Cy asked, staring out into the darkness. Svrion was still holding her tightly. She felt safe in his arms. If the world died at the moment, she didn't care. As long as Svrion was there, with his arms around her, she could live for eternity.
"Look at that," Svrion replied. He pointed to the two walls that glowed different colors in the distance. All of a sudden, golden waves shot out of each wall and connected together. Cy noticed that they formed a triangle.
From this triangle rose up a tower of rainbow magic that stretched to the very limit of the shadowy sky. A bright light consumed the world, and a black velvet hat randomly plopped down on top of the duo. Cy and Svrion fell unconscious.
………
What seemed like thirty years later – though in reality, only a few minutes – Cy and Svrion woke up and groaned. They were in some velvet chamber. Some rustling indicated they were not alone.
"Who's there?" Came a voice.
"Cyrrielle and Svrion…"
"CY! IT'S YOU!"
"Celton, is that you?" While the two of them recognized each other, Svrion had the sense to realize they were inside a magical hat and pulled it off. The open air and light fell upon them. Hufanse, Aundren, and Celton gasped as they saw Cy and Svrion. After a brief period of weird silence, Cy started the reunion by shouting her brother's name and jumping into his arms.
With a heartfelt cry, the rest of them started to hug and cheer. Hufanse and Aundren embraced Svrion as Celton and Cy enjoyed a warm hug. Then, Cy gave Aundren and Hufanse both a friendly little cuddle. As you imagine, Hufanse blushed like crazy and Aundren just smiled. Celton shook hands with Svrion. Then, they all had a group hug.
"We did it!" Hufanse exclaimed, hugging Aundren out of sheer joy. Svrion had to hug Cy after being relieved that he was still alive. And as he promised, he kissed her cheeks.
Cy gave a short gasp and she felt warmth radiating from her cheek to all parts of her body. She felt like a rose being reminded that it was spring; time to bloom, and the warmth of the spring air had finally touched her petals. It was a very magical moment.
"We're finally together!" she cried. "This is perfect!" She again reached out and the four others hugged her.
"Awww, how sweet. A touching reunion!" Cy gasped. The five immediately turned around. Facing them were five Magic Swordsmen.
"We heard the commotion and decided to check it out," said one with an exotic accent. "Now, the party is over. All of you are breaking the law. Our job is to see to it that your punishment is served… you will all cooperate or die!" Cy shook her head with horror, her face displaying a look of terrified anger.
No…why does my life have to go terribly wrong just when it goes perfectly right?