Tournament of Souls Chapter 11

Regional-Finals

"You know, you might not be as stupid as you look. This is not hard. Let' think about this. I mean… I'll think about it, and you can join in when you know the words." – Terry Pratchett's Men at Arms from the Discworld Series

Editor's Note: WARNING! This chapter contains intentional spelling errors. All the "ye", "ja" and "ya" -ing is intentional. The two terms are both substitutes for "you". They are interchangeable, so if one is used, and the next moment the other is used instead, it is not an error. Any other errors remain erroneous and should immediately be reported to the proper authorities.

P.S. There may be other similar misspellings within, or referring to what Alicia says. This note continues to count for all other chapters containing Alicia, or other characters who happen to speak like, are disguised as, or are Alicia in disguise.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As Lucien walked to the front of the shop, Aliya and Raoul tried to lighten the mood and make the regional seem morelike all the other tournaments they had competed in. After all, Lucien had lost in the final round, and even earlier plenty of times before. But this wasn't just another tournament. Not only was it their ticket to fame and potentially becoming the World Champ, but it was the only way to try and discover what had happened to Laronn. If they lost, then Laronn would go un-avenged.

But if he lost, would it really be that bad? Why should he, some kid from a place called West City on the East Coast of the U.S. of A. home of the brave and the lazy, be able to become world champion defeating the likes of Seto Kaiba, Joey Wheeler, and Yugi Moto, or even just be able to bring the one who… killed Laronn to justice?

Because nobody else will. No one other than me, Raoul, and Aliya know what happened. But why me? I may have a high IQ, but I'm no hero; but there's no hero available, so I'll just have to do my best, and if I fail… I can't fail.

"How do you think we should celebrate when you win? We could all go over to my place or maybe Aliya's house…" Raoul broke into Lucien's reverie. Lucien responded with rather more harshness than was required.

"Even if I do win, don't you think you should be with your parents? Don't you have a funeral to plan?" Raoul's face froze and his eyes fell to the ground and the smile slipping off his face.

"Yeah, I suppose I better. Wonder how we're going to have a funeral without the body though…" Raoul stood there, lost in the potpourri of thought and memory. Aliya pulled Lucien to the side.

"What did you do that for? You should be trying to help him get over Laronn's demise rather than rubbing it in and making him feel bad about it! What the hell's wrong with you." Lucien shrunk visibly under her gaze, his shoulders hunched forward, and his face fell like that of an admonished child.

"Sorry, the stress must be getting to me." He straightened up, his face now expressionless. "It won't happen again." Lucien turned back and walked up to Raoul putting a hand on his shoulder.

"On second thought, it might be a good idea for you to stay out of the house before you have to walk out. If past actions are anything to go by, your parents are going to be blaming each other for the first half of the night, and drunk for the rest of it. I'll see if I can soften my mother up to letting you stay over at my house for the night." Raoul started to smile.

"So we party at Aliya's and then you and me go over to your house for the night?"

"We'll see about the party part." Knowing that this was as close to a yes as he was going to get, Raoul punched Lucien's shoulder for encouragement.

"Don't worry about the duel, mate, that's the easy part. Just make sure you know what you're going to say to your mum!" They both had a bit of a laugh over that. Then as they reached the front Lucien sobered up.

"Let's hear what Mr. Dongard has to say. He does look anxious to say something or another." This was a bit of an overstatement. The truth was, that Mr. Dongard didn't look anxious to do much of anything other than make all those who had been eliminated feel bad. When he realized that Todd along with several other top eight contestants was no longer there it almost looked like he was going to cry, or at least blink. None the less he started with his announcement.

"Once again, congratulations to our two finalists. Just don't get too excited, you haven't actually gotten anywhere important yet. The Industrial Illusions World Tournament Board of Directors, United States of America Division, Sub-Division M.D.12 has decided that the State Championships will be done using Kaiba Corp.'s Duel Monsters Imaging Platforms." This announcement was met with cheers from the crowd, with only the occasional person screaming "We want Duel Disks!"

"About a month ago Kaiba Corp. officials met with the mayor and the World Tournament Division of Industrial Illusions. Kaiba Corp. wanted to add some public entertainment systems to the city. They timed it so that the new projectors would be ready in time for this tournament so the board decided that the finals would be conducted using the new system as a sort of surprise grand opening. I tried to veto it but was overruled." Mr. Dongard leered down at the cheering spectators. Mr. Kiwasaki walked in from outside.

"Would the finalists and the… the remaining top ten duelists please come outside, the bus driver is starting to get impatient." Mr. Dongard followed Mr. Kiwasaki back to the door.

"I'm sorry if you were expecting a limosine, you won't get one of those until at least the National Championship. That is, if you ever get that far." He sneered and walked out the door to the bus.

When Lucien, Aliya, Raoul, and the remaining top ten duelists(Max, Alicia, Jonathan, Ethan, and of course, Amy were the only ones left) got to the bus, they heard Mr. Kiwasaki and Mr. Dongard (or dung beetle as some of the other duelists were calling him) arguing.

"It's supposed to be a public opening! It isn't a public opening of the new system if you don't let these spectators come with us for the final match!" The dung beetle finally relented, he picked up a megaphone and related the decision to the crowd.

"Fine, will the top ten finalists please get on the bus first, and then as much of the rabble as can fit may board." Aliya boarded first, with Raoul behind her and Lucien coming up next. He looked back to find that Amy was entering the bus right behind him. By now Raoul and Aliya had already sat down near the front, the bus had the usual 8 or so rows of seats on each side, and each seat was designed to hold two people. Ignoring this limitation, Lucien squeezed in between Aliya and Raoul. It was a tight fit, but it meant that there was definitively no room for Amy to force her presence on him.

Trying and failing to look pitiable, Amy conceded defeat and sat at the back of the bus where she promptly began to flirt with a fan-to-be. Just as the bus was about to leave, Lily came running up screaming bloody murder and got let onto the bus. Evidently she hadn't wanted to miss out on the chance to be on the team. She went to find a seat as close to Alicia as possible. The bus started to move and Aliya and Raoul did their utmost to sandwich Lucien between them in the two person seat. Somewhere some spectator had been able to get a seat on the bus and would be grateful to Lucien for his self effacing sacrifice- that is, if he or she knew about it; which, needless to say they didn't.

Finally, after much squishing, the bus arrived in the park that dominated the center of the city, near the river but upstream from the bridge. The projectors had been the center of a large restoration project on a hill that was generally used for sledding during the winter. Of course, excessive sledding wore down the grass, caused erosion, and other problems that were noticed only by environmentalists, government officials, and parents and through advertising campaigns had sold the idea of a restoration project to the masses.

I don't think a duel station was quite what either the officials or the masses had in mind. That is not of course defining the masses as people who didn't care about obscure environmental facts and statistics that don't actively prevent them from sledding down the hill anytime it snows. They would have been overjoyed to know that they were building a duel station. Especially seeing as with the cover on it, it would make an excellentjump for sleds.

Right now though, very few people were thinking of sledding. When they arrived at the street that separated the urban jungle from the urban park, everyone filed off the bus. As soon as it was away from the constraints of the bus, the line became a mob and someone on the bus must have had a cell phone because following the bus were several vans full of duel enthusiasts.

Almost as soon as Lucien had gotten off the bus, a hand started pulling him to the duel station by the collar. The hand of course belonged to Mr. Dongard. Alicia hadrefused the indignity of being dragged along. Lucien didn't have a choice.

The duel field was more or less like many that Lucien had seen on tv. Instead of the traditional red and blue booths for the duelists, both were a silver color as was the majority of the siding for the field. However, on the either side of each booth was a glass bubble with a prism like surface. The majority of the people there were puzzled as to the purpose of the bubble, but were to excited to ask any questions. Mr. Dongard positioned Lucien on one side of the arena and Alicia walked to the other. Neither boarded the lift to the field level and Mr. Dongard walked around to the small booth on the side reserved for the judge and got on the lift. He faced the audience and brought the megaphone to his mouth.

"Ok people, you are about to witness three things: first of all, the final round of The West City Area Regional Tournament. This is also the opening ceremony for this duel station. If it is a success, several more will be built." The crowd cheered.

"Finally this is a test of a new variant of the duel station. You may notice the gems on the sides. These will not only assist with the holographs and other special effects, but will also be used to represent the duelist. For instance, in a tournament it would be arranged so that each duelist would have a different color displayed on the crystal. We're still working out some of the details on how that system will work, but for now the crystals will represent the players' decks." Somewhere in the crowd a voice piped up.

"Where's the mayor? Shouldn't he cut the ribbon in the opening ceremony?" Mr. Dongard glared down at the offending speaker.

"Well, we were going to have him cut a nice ribbon with a gold fringe, but then he remembered that he had a meeting. Too bad. But if you insist I'll cut something." He fished around in his pocket and took out a piece of thread and a nail trimmer. He handed one end of the piece of thread to an audience member and cut it.

"There, is everybody happy now? Good. Now will the duelists please board enter the duel station and prepare to duel." Alicia opened the gate to the lift and stepped on. There must have been some kind of sensor because as soon as both feet were on it, it began to rise. Lucien couldn't figure out how to open his, so he just vaulted over the gate. His platform rose to meet Alicia's at field level. However, neither combatant seemed to know what to do next.

Mr. Dongard had turned to face the field and was tapping his foot in annoyance.

"It would appear that neither of our finalists has ever watched a duel on tv. You need to put your deck down on the appointed place to start the duel." Alicia glared at Mr. Dongard and put her deck down. Lucien followed suit.

On either side of Alicia's platform the domes turned red; Lucien's turned black. The field powered up and hologram projectors rose up out of the corners of the field and from the fronts of each elevated booth. A spinner divided into red and black portions appeared in the middle of the field. A disembodied white glove gave it a spin. After it had spun around a few times it landed on red.

"Alicia will go first." Mr. Dongard announced.

Alicia drew her first six cards grinning.

A holographic billboard, rather like the one above the court at basketball games had appeared above the field. On it, life points were displayed along with camera footage of either player, from the front of course. Lucien found the camera at the front of his booth and glared at it eliciting giggles from the audience. Alicia adjusted her clothes to suit the angle. An additional screen was also present, presumably for close ups and different camera angles of the duel.

Alicia: 8000

Lucien: 8000

"I'll set a monster face down. Next I'll put down two cards on my back field. It's your move."

As she set each card, an enlarged holographic representation appeared on the field. The holograms even extended to the shadows beneath each card which seemed unnecessarily threatening. It made Lucien nervous. It almost looked like something under the card had moved.

And according to the whispers from the hill, it wasn't entirely his imaginiation either.

Alicia was getting impatient. She wanted to win this already. She thought she was U.S. Championship material, the regional and the state champs should be a breeze. She'd gotten herself the cards she needed to win, and now she had every intention of doing it. The prizes from those tournaments alone would be worth it. And the prestige would warrant invitations to additional tournaments with yet more prizes. But she couldn't win if the numbskull standing opposite her wouldn't make his move.

"How, lead for brains, could ja, I don't know, speed it up a bit?" Then, for emphasis, she added, "I don't have all day ya know."

Lucien looked up slowly. He had been absorbed examining the inside of the booth he was occupying (His on camera image had looked quite bizarre as well. Among other things it looked un-professional and amateurish. Not to mention what the convex lens of the camera had done when he had been examining it. Aliya made a note to talk to him about it afterward.) He'd never seen what the insides of these looked like before. There had probably been a special about duel stations on the Discovery Channel at some point, but he hadn't watched it. After all, if something hasn't been a special on the Discovery Channel, then it must be 1. impossible to get a camera into 2. impossible to get diagrams and/or pictures of 3. politically incorrect 4. controversial and 5. so insignificant that even the sick, elderly, and chronically bored people that keep such shows on the air would rather watch test patterns than learn about it.

Lucien spoke slowly. Unlike Alicia, he had a good reason to be in some kind of rush. What with walking home and his mother expecting him to be home at a certain time (she had never bothered to tell him what this time was, or even that there was such a time, but if he arrived later than what she deemed correct, there would be trouble), it would be in his favor for the duel to be short as that way he could start home sooner, and have less chance of getting home only to meet reprimands.

However, winning was more important that receiving a pleasant welcome upon his arrival home. In fact, it would be the first time in his life that Lucien had ever felt that he really needed to win something. There had always been a desire; a lust for victory however slight, yes, to not have that would to be not human. But never before had Lucien really needed to win. If he lost now, he wouldn't be able to show his face to Aliya or Raoul again.

Well that's a lie. He would be able to. He just wouldn't be worthy of it. If he lost this duel, he would no longer have that spark of pride that made Lucien…. well; Lucien. He would win this duel. So he wouldn't rush. He'd take it as it came, roll with the punches, and when the opportunity came, let fly a blow of its own. And by Joan, it had better be a knockout.

"You think you can win, don't you?" Alicia was shocked. That was exactly what she's been thinking. But you already knew that. After all, I told you.

"You can't though. Sorry, that's not right. It's just that you're not going to win this duel here and now. It is neither the right time nor place. Maybe on a different day you would have stood a chance, but not now. I'm sure that you'd like to hear an explanation. But I'm afraid that will have to wait as I have neither the time nor the ability to tell you the reasons behind this, and there are many."

"I tell you this in full knowledge that it will make no difference. You will still duel me just as hard as you would have in any case, perhaps even harder. I tell you only because you have a right to know, and that there might have been the smallest fraction of a percentile chance that you would surrender. But that time has past."

Lucien drew his card without flourish. His face was ice; the ultimate poker face; for ice is not frozen into an expression that may betray some aspect of humanity but instead is influenced by everything surrounding it and even reflects the face of the one who seeks to penetrate its mysteries.

"I'll summon the Bistro Butcher (1800/1000) in attack mode." The purple demon shimmered into existence on the field. It licked blood of its hook and grinned savagely at the audience with pointed teeth. The overhead gave them a close up. The spectators shivered collectively. Lucien was really glad it was on his side of the field. Even Alicia was unnerved. The monster's stats had appeared both on the overhead and on a screen in Alicia's booth. Lucien had the benefit of the actual card and for once it had been decided that redundancy wasn't required.

"Now I'll have my Butcher prepare your monster for the frying pan." Bistro Butcher leapt forward and a large turtle with a space ship for a shell appeared. The fiend used its hook to serrate a leg and slit the turtle's throat with a knife. It strung the leg up to drain and pegged it to the outside of Alicia's booth. It walked back to Lucien's side of the field and made motions toward Alicia that mimed eating. Alicia looked a shade of green comparable to that of her UFO Turtle (1400/1200).

Before either the body or the leg had the time to disappear, Alicia flipped up a card. The holographic representation raised and was revealed to be Backfire.

"I just activated Backfire. That means that when one of my Fire monsters is destroyed and sent from the field to the graveyard, you lose 500 life points."

The crowd of spectators looked for a holographic representation of the damage. They had almost given up hope when a boy in the front row threw up into a sack. The leg that had been pinned to the wall was twitching violently and swinging back and forth, banging against the wall it was pinned to. The nail that had been used to pin it up was visibly coming loose until all of a sudden the leg gave the wall a vicious kick and the nail came out of the wall and flew straight and true as an arrow at Lucien.

Without the time to consider the virtues of taking the hit like a man, Lucien crouched just as the nail was about to give him a third eye. However, instead of flying onward, the nail stopped dead above his head and the tip flipped downward. From this distance he could tell that it was quite rusty. Lucien glared coldly at his monster who shrugged innocently as only one who has never heard of tetanus can (This only applies to matters concerning rusty objects. I'm quite sure that people, and monsters can shrug innocently even if they have heard of tetanus. I just haven't seen them yet).

Meanwhile the nail dropped down and hit Lucien's head, and upon contact, disappeared. Lucien hardly felt it; but he still felt it.

Alicia: 8000

Lucien: 7500

"Now as you probably know, my UFO Turtle has an effect. When it is destroyed as a result of battle, I am allowed to special summon any Fire monster in my deck that has1500 or less attack to the field in attack mode. I choose to bring out Solar Flare Dragon (1500/1000)."

This new monster wound its way out of a previously invisible hatch on top of the UFO, and at the same time the fire covered the new monster consumed the vanquished one. Lucien imagined he could feel the heat radiating off of the dragon. However, the haze of heat above the monster, and the sweat that was beginning to gather on his face encouraged a different reasoning. This simulation is almost too accurate. Not only does it portray the monster in perfect detail. And this it did as anyone watching could see individual bits of molten rock along the belly of the monster moving, melding together, and breaking apart as the serpent writhed.

It even releases heat. I just hope that Kaiba Corp had the sense not to use completely realistic amounts of heat. Otherwise this platform would meltdown and both combatants would probably suffer from heat stroke if they weren't instantly incinerated…Well, seeing as I'm not visibly charring along the edges, it would do to assume that they made sure that only a safe amount of heat, or presumably cold in the case of a icy monster, is released.

"My new monster has two abilities. First off, if I have another Pyro-type monster on my side of the field you can't attack Solar Flare Dragon. Also at each of my end phases, you lose 500 life points." Lucien looked over the cards in his hand. Nope, nothing he could use immediately.

"I play Gravekeeper's Servant. Now whenever you declare an attack you must send a card from the top of your deck to the graveyard. I'll set a card face down and end my turn." Alicia whipped the top card off her deck grinning at the audience making sure that her auburn hair didn't cover too much of her face. This was going to be her home team after all, her primary fan base.

"For my first move I'll summon my second Solar Flare Dragon." Now it is unclear whether the first Solar Flare Dragon split into two or whether the second one emerged from behind the other. Either way the effect was quite impressive and at the end of it, the dragons had their tails entwined and there was a low fire raging behind them.

"Now I'll play the field spell card Molten Destruction." The bottom of the field itself began to change. No longer divided by thin white lines, if one were to look down on it, it would appear that they were hovering above an active volcano. The only truly three dimensional component of the image, as realistic as the rest of it appeared, was the summit which extended a few feet above the level of the field, occasionally belching smoke or a bit of rock.

"This field spell increases the attack of every fire attributed monster on the field by 500 and decreases their defense by 400. That means that both of my Solar Flare Dragon's (2000/600) now have 2000 attack. I'll now have my first dragon attack your Bistro Butcher."

Alicia put the top card from her deck in the graveyard in accordance with Gravekeeper's Servant and then one of the fiery serpents leapt forwards, and paused in front of Bistro Butcher as if to think. Then it swallowed him whole and belched a bit of fire at Lucien. It ruffled his hair a bit, nothing more.

Alicia: 8000

Lucien: 7300

"Now my other monster will attack your life points directly." Lucien cringed. He was not looking forward to his first direct attack.

Again Alicia slipped the top card of her deck into the graveyard. The second Solar Flare Dragon let lunged forward and let loose a blast of fire. Lucien could feel the heat of the illusory flames and gripped the side off the box to prevent himself from being knocked over. Then the attack ended and the only lasting damage was to his life points.

Alicia: 8000

Lucien: 5300

"That will be all for this turn. Oh, but don't forget that you take 500 damage for each Solar Flare Dragon." The dragons came together for double streams of fire. Note to self, next time you duel on one of these things bring a comb. But the ladies like the windswept look my hair gets. Oh, come on…

Alicia: 8000

Lucien: 4300

Lucien drew his card.

"I'll summon Servant of Catabolism (700/500)." The strange creature appeared and began hopping about.

"I'll activate my face down Robbin' Zombie and use my monster's ability to attack directly." Lucien's monster looked thoughtful almost as if it was calculating something. Then it looked up and sent a forceful stream of water up into the air. The monster then, as Alicia and her monsters watched the water, ran around the Solar Flare Dragon's with surprising speed and jumped up onto Alicia's box. As soon as she looked around it sprayed her with water and returned to its place on Lucien's side of the field.

Alicia: 7300

Lucien: 4300

"And because I did battle damage to you, you loose the top card of your deck." The zombie pictured on Robbin' Zombie stepped out of the card and beckoned. Then a hole opened up under Alicia's deck. It came up again a moment later and a card was spat out into her graveyard. Lucien noted on the overhead that it was her third Solar Flare Dragon.

"To end my turn I set a card. It's your move. I've already told you the future. What are you going to do to change destiny?"

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Merry Christmas!

(or happy day before Hanukkah)