How the upcoming scenes are ever going to come across as plausible is beyond me, but hell it was fun to do. Standard disclaimers apply.

Chapter Five.

Vienna International Airport Runway Twelve. 11:13 pm.

Kaiba knows that his company's pilots are as good as they come, but that doesn't prevent him from feeling a faint touch of relief when the flight touches down without colliding with any other vehicles on a still, silent and (most worryingly) dark as the grave runway.

'All systems are coming up normal, flight has touched down with little to no interference, Mister Kaiba.' The pilot is looking through the window with some confusion even as he says this. He's thinking the same thing as Kaiba is- wondering where the hell the lights and people are and what the hell they might have just touched down into. It's like some kind of movie about dead darkness and creatures in the shadows. If he listens closely enough Kaiba can almost imagine movement in the shadows from creatures that are anything but human.

But of course that is just the kind of totally and utterly ridiculous crap that the mutt would usually come out with, and Kaiba had never had any respect for such blatantly obvious Hollywood movies anyway.

That doesn't change the fact that there are weird things out here. or at least there are if the news reports and Yugi Muto are to be believed. He finds it slightly ironic that he considers Yugi more reliable than the news reports.

Or maybe it's not that ironic at all.

The co pilot is glancing at his team mate and muttering, both of them seem to have decided that this whole thing was a bad idea. His nervousness earns him an annoyed glance from his employer.

'Whenever you're ready, co-pilot,' Kaiba realises he hasn't actually bothered to ask for their names.

'Right, sir… Of course. Commencing Landing Final System Checks.'

He doesn't sound sure a bout it, but Kaiba lets that go because honestly, there's a lot more he has to be concerned about.

And then the movie starts.

Something large, white, thin and very much alive (or maybe not) is gripping the glass window of the aeroplane cockpit in fingers as smooth and pale as glaciers. Kaiba doesn't so much as gasp in astonishment as he sees the industrial strength, high velocity resistant window splintering beneath its grip.

The pilots aren't exactly as reserved as their employer.

And neither, it seems, is Wheeler, still in the back of the aircraft thought doubtlessly no longer sitting in his chair.

'Holy shit—'

'—What the hell is that?!'

Highway En-Route to Vienna International Airport. 11:05 pm.

Yugi has to admit, he's never been in a vehicle which was moving quite this fast as this before in his life. Except possibly a jumbo jet or while on the back of Tristan's motorcycle.

And even Tristan has to be a more careful driver than Yami. He's also fairly sure that Yami's never had a lesson in his life. That would explain all the swerving.

'Where are we now?'

'I'd be able to tell you if we had a map, Yami. Ach! L-look, Yami, I don't care what you say about circumstances—'

A hard collision with a rolled over trashcan which has somehow found its way onto the freeway near shocks him into silence but somehow he swallows and keeps talking. Yugi really can carry out a conversation in the strangest of situations. It must be a talent he learned from Joey.

'…I'm still pretty sure that this—'

Crunch.

'Counts—'

Hands overhead to keep his skull from cracking against the roof (which given how utterly short Yugi still is, is really saying something about just how insanely Yami is driving. 'As stealing!'

'No problem we'll give it back. I hardly think his is a good time to be discussion the matter and its owner is probably one of the things trying to catch up with us. Which one is the clutch?'

'Uh, well in Japanese cars it's on the left but… ah, there it is, there it is!'

'Right.'

Another hard lurch throws him back in the seat. On the other hand, at least Yami seems to be getting the hang of it.

He's the King of all Games and yet the guy can't even handle a moving vehicle.

'Yami, giving this vehicle back depends entirely on us keeping it in one piece in the first place! Can't you slow down just a little? Anyway, how exactly do you suppose they're going to catch up? Those things don't look like they can drive vehicles,'

'No, but you'd be surprised at the level of speed is capable in a body possessed of supernatural forces.'

The white flash shoots past the window with a speed that makes Yami's driving look like a steady crawl in rush-hour. Yugi tastes burning as something hot (or maybe boiling cold) skims past the outside of the land rover.

A quiet hiss of anger from the seat beside him, feral, strange and very much not-human. He's only aware of it because the mental link allows him to feel it; otherwise it'd be impossible to hear him over the roar of the engine. 'See what I mean?'

'Yeah. Yeah, I think I get the picture. We can't be that far away, but I can't exactly read the signs. I recognize that tree patch from the last time we were here, so we're going the right way. Possibly on the wrong side of the road, but…'

The white flash is back. In front of them this time, sweeping out of nowhere and colliding thickly with the glass windshield at one hundred miles per hour. The glass cracks and splinters and shards break through as claws which probably used to be fingers smash against it.

He can see the face , totally reshaped after the collision with the glass, broken bones and a smashed up jaw and yet the thing is still screaming. The eyes are staring at him. Wide, bright, disturbingly human…

…Frightened.

No. not frightened. Terrified. Even more so than Yugi is right at this very moment.

'Yami!'

'On it. Wheel!'

Yugi grabs the wheel on impulse and doesn't even think to argue (or comment on how this really isn't a Hollywood action scene and probably shouldn't be conducted like one) when Yami opens the skylight and starts to climb out onto the room.

Vienna International Airport Runway Twelve. 11:13 pm.

Nobody has asked Kaiba exactly what it was that just tried to burst into the aircraft through the shatterproof windows but nobody really seems to care that much about the details. All that matters for now is that it's gone again, and Téa can finally stop herself shaking and Bakura can pull himself out of the gap between the chairs where he fell as soon as the creature started pounding on the metal.

…Or two creatures, they aren't entirely sure, but since they dimmed the lights in the aircraft, everything has gone still and silent again.

'Okay,' Mai balances herself against the door of the cockpit, 'well, this is nice, isn't it? Know what, I'm not doing this anymore, Wheeler, you can damn well save the world on your own next time.'

'C'mon, Mai, we all know you don't mean it. Still, what in the name of hell were those freaks?'

'What do you mean those freaks? Joey, don't tell me you heard more than one of them!'

'Well sorry, ' Kura, but I wasn't exactly stoppin' to count!'

'Human.' Kaiba puts in bluntly.

That earns him a few odd glances, but what should he care about their confusion? He understood from what Yugi told him that the people in Vienna wouldn't exactly be normal and he knew what he would see from the second they had touched down. He figure Yugi would've had the sense to warn his cheerleading squad just what they were coming into. Apparently not.

He leaves his pilots to deal with the mess in the cockpit and steps fully into the main area of the aircraft, observing the frightened passengers with a hint of amusement. 'Yugi mentioned it. Those creatures are humans. Or at least, they used to be. Look in the eyes and you can even see it. It's a sick situation but I've seen no reason not to believe it's true.'

'Oh,' Mai's voice is dry as a bone. 'Wonderful. Just what we need to know, Kaiba. Not only are we up against freaks but those freaks also happen to be the citizens of Austria. Wish to hell that Yugi had told us all that before we got in the aircraft.'

Tristan glances out the window. 'Sure is still out there, isn't it? I mean, now that we got rid of it… Quiet.'

'Yeah. Too qui—'

'Ac-hem.'

'Sorry, that just kinda came out. But, yeah, it's quiet. Creepy, even.

'And dark. I'm not seeing any runway lights, no lit up road signs… no anything.'

'Where is everyone?' Téa swallows and somehow, she finds herself looking in Kaiba's direction for an explanation. He is, after all, the only one of them who is for some strange reason not yet having a fit. 'It can't be that everyone in the whole City looks like… like that thing that just tried to attack us, right?'

'Actually that's highly likely,' Kaiba says. 'That thing was human, however little it looked like it. It's probably happened to every damn human life form in this whole city, if not the country.'

'Then what about us? I'm not feelin' any extra teeth sprouting here, man. You don't think we'll end up like that, do ya?'

'No you wouldn't. It must be a primary infection situation.'

'A what?'

'Never listen in biology, Wheeler? It means that you had to be present in the city when the event began in order to be affected, perhaps, or maybe it's some kind of genetic manifestation. Either way I think all of us will be safe for now.

'Except, obviously, if you name is Yuugi.'

'Exactly.'

'Well, he called us, didn't he? He sure sounded human to me.'

'He sounded human when he contacted you over eight hours ago, Wheeler. There's no saying it's the same now.'

'…Crap.'

'Exactly. So you'd better hope that the guy you're here to rescue isn't just going to start doing what the rest of these freaks are doing right now. Namely try devour your souls.'

'Man,' Wheeler leans against a chair, his face turning just a little paler than it usually is. 'Then it must be like something outta Dawn of the Dead out there… s'cept with living people (I think) and freaky black skies, instead of dead people an' shopping malls.'

'Dawn of the Dead had a shopping mall?'

'Sure it did. Man, you really need to brush up on your international cinema.'

'You're the one who can't get past the opening credits of It's a Wonderful Life.'

'Whatever. Look, guys are you're certain those things out there are alive, then? Because they sure don't look it to me.'

Kaiba opens a briefcase in front of him with a click. 'They're alive. Most of them, anyway. Some of them are probably just being driven by the will of their possession right now whether they're living or not. They're like puppets, dominated by their own over-endowed senses, capable of annihilating people with a single touch, but they're definitely alive. And they'll stay that way, at least until the Shadow Realm has drained them of all their uses or one of us kills them.'

'Yeah. You really know how to bring some humour into an apocalypse, don't ya?'

'I think I know about being possessed, Mutt.'

'Heh, what do you know, he admits it.'

'Uh-huh, and anyway, Kaiba are you saying that I don't know about being brain-controlled? Cause you'd better believe I do.'

Mai looks up. 'Yeah and let's not forget me, Kaiba. The Oricalcos thing, that messed with my brain, my focus and my hairdo all in one shot?'

Téa raises her hand. 'Yeah, and me, while you're at it.'

There's a silent pause while Tristan glances to Mai, Mai turns to Joey and Joey looks at Téa.

'I think that says it all, then,' Bakura doesn't even bother to mention himself.

'Hm. Yeah, pretty much all of us have of us have had that experience at some point or another, so nobody is exactly a special case. It was different every time, it just depends what kind of possession we were undergoing and I don't think they have a classificatory system for that kind of thing… that said, they probably should do.'

'Don't remind me, Téa, please. My thief is bad enough now that we're no longer sharing a body and he's not attempting to take over the world every opportunity he gets, but before that…' Bakura's shiver can be felt throughout the entire aircraft. Even Seto Kaiba twitches just a little at the reminder of the thing that Bakura could become.

'Urgh. Is it just me, or does hanging around with Yugi and Yami and all of their… their let's-go-save-the-world-ness really, really mess with your head?'

'No, hun, I think alcohol is what's messing with your head right now. Serves you right, really. I'm surprised you were as sober as you were, what with all the sake we managed to confiscate off of your person before we got on this flight. A conventional airport probably wouldn't have let you through the door.'

'Oh, well excuse me, I kinda wasn't expecting to get abducted and dragged halfway round the world in the middle of the night, so I didn't exactly prepare myself for a possible catastrophe and… and Kaiba, what is that, exactly?'

The briefcase closes with another click. 'What does it look like, Taylor?

'Well it… kinda looks like a rather dangerous piece of mechanical weaponry.'

'Also known as a 48 Calibre pistol. Be careful it's heavy.'

'What, so first you brought is all the way out here and now you're giving us weaponry?'

'Kaiba, you can't be suggesting that we use that…'

'Well let's see, this entire city is full of creatures that won't pause to give a pointless speech of their terrible abilities before ripping your limbs off (or whatever else in hell they're planning to do to us) the way so many of your usual opponents do, but, last I checked, they were still flesh and blood. They'll still respond appropriately to firearms. Probably.'

'You think we should shoot them?'

'No, Taylor, I'm giving you the guns as a form of decoration. You're supposed to open the gun barrel in order to fill the—'

'Zip it already, Kaiba, I know how to operate a gun.'

'Wow, the police force really did teach you something useful. I'm almost impressed. Do me a favour then and give your little friends here a run through of the basics.'

'But you just said that those things out there are… alive, didn't you? As in they're people.'

'I'm not suggesting you go on a gun totting rampage and shoot at everything in sight. I'm not even all that certain that conventional weapons like this will be much good anyway. Just try and keep the damn things away from us so we don't have to find out for certain.'

'Man, you really are the token of generosity today, Kaiba.'

'For your information I have shares out here, mutt,' he pauses to click an air rifle that has suddenly appeared from… somewhere. Nobody is quite sure exactly where. 'The end of Europe would also be the end of a large percentage of our Kaiba Corporation Customs. Now, as much as I hate passing the situation to you goons, it's your call from here.'

'…How come?'

'Well he's your friend, isn't he? We're about twelve miles from the central city and we have a choice. We either all stay here and wait for Yuugi to come to us, or we go and try to find him in a city several hundred kilometres wide and filled with spiritually possessed zombies. I think I know which one I'm opting for, Wheeler.'

'…And what if Yugi doesn't get to us?' Tristan asks, hangover forgotten as he fingers a hand rifle. 'What if what you thought might've happened to him has already…'

'Then we'll find out, fix the rest of this mess and get the living hell out of here,' Kaiba speaks as evenly as any man who has been handling fire arms, sharp objects, martial arts and duel cards all his life. 'Without him, if necessary.'

Nobody says anything in response to that, because nobody wants to draw any closer to admitting that he might be right.

Entering Vienna Airspace. 11:23 pm.

'Uh… sir?'

'…'

'Mister Kaiba, sir?'

'Mff. W-what? Oh, I… I wasn't asleep.'

'Of course not, sir. I just… thought you'd like to know that we're now approaching Austrian airspace within forty five minutes of the landing site, though I think we may be experiencing a small technical difficulty.

That wakes him up a little. Technical difficulties of planes are never a good thing. Especially not technical difficulties on Kaiba Corporation planes because it stands to reason that planes as good as theirs shouldn't ever get technical difficulties at all. 'Technical difficult? Oh-kay, define "small technical difficulty" for me.'

'There appears to be no signal whatsoever from the airbase and we've been signalling them for going on half an hour now. It's likely that the chaos we observed on international stations is still going on here. For all we know the entire airport is in chaos. Or shut down completely.'

'Yeah,' Mokuba rubs his eyes and continues to tell himself he really wasn't sleeping. 'I figured it might be something like that.'

'As your advisor in this situation, I strongly suggest we opt to turn back now, Mister Kaiba.'

'…'

Marcus shifts a little in response to Mokuba's silence. No wonder, though. Mokuba expected that.

'What's your opinion, mister Kaiba?'

He wishes he looked a little older than he does because he's really starting to get how Yugi must've felt being mistaken for a sixth grader all the time, and Mokuba knows that when his brother was this age, he already had these guys asking "how high" when he said jump. For some reason Mokuba just can't seem to emulate the effect his brother has on them.

Still, he's doing his best, and so long as he's technically paying their wages in his older brother's absence…

'…No.' He looks up, resolutely. 'We're not turning back..'

'What about over flights? Any other sign of planes within the vicinity.'

'Nothing within Vienna airspace, and the only other European-bound flight appears to be a Boeing 474 currently en route from Cairo to London International Airport, sir. Other than that there's not much that we can pick up from here, but the silence could suggest anything. There could be vehicles down there we're just not aware of, but it's still extremely dangerous to attempt a landing without a ground crew or guidance.

'So? This is Kaiba Corp. The pilot can handle it. We only employ the best here.'

'…Sir?'

'Don't bother, Marcus. If our pilot can't land an aircraft without having the whole thing on autopilot then he shouldn't be working for us in the first place, Marcus. We hire the best here and if that guy in there really is the best? Then he's going to land the plane. Besides,' he shuffles a little. 'If my brother is down there –and I have as good feeling that he is – then we're going down their after him. No buts.'

'Sir… Mokuba, I should remind you that we're not even certain Mister Kaiba is in Vienna.'

Mokuba smiles at him and means it. 'Guess you just aren't lucky enough to have a duellist's instinct for seeking out other duellists then, do you Marcus?' Or a little brother's instincts for seeking out the older one, he adds in thought, but doesn't say aloud.

'Ah, Sir, where are you—?'

'The cockpit. Obviously. They might need some help in there.'

'But I—'

'Yeah, Marcus?'

'…Nothing sir. It doesn't matter.'

Mokuba nods –yes, it really doesn't matter what Marcus thinks about any of this, no matter how close he might be to being right– and turns to enter the cockpit.

Highway En-Route to Vienna International Airport. 11:23 pm.

He isn't sure exactly what it that Yami did up there. all he knows is that one minute his view is being obscured by a creature looking just about ready to tear him to pieces if it got through the windshield, and the next Yami is muttering strange words under his breath and the creature is thrown from the vehicle on a flurry of black sparks. Which is totally fine by him. He really likes being able to see the road he's driving on.

He also likes having control of the wheel so that now he decides how fast they're moving rather than Yami. Still he's starting to think Yami had a point for speeding.

'Whoa!'

'Hm. Yeah. Not a move I like to use often,' Yami is grimacing faintly as he ducks back down from the skylight, still shaking strange black particles of… (Yugi can only think to call it "anti-light") away from his fingers.

'Yami what the hell did you do?'

'A little reverse shadow charge into its face, nothing more. Don't worry I doubt very much I damaged it permanently.'

'Oh… oh-kay, I had no idea you could do that.'

'Actually neither did I until I actually tried to. Those things are like lightning even in close quarters I had to discharge three kinds before I even caught up to it.'

'You're bleeding.'

It's running right down his arm and only now does Yami seem to notice it. 'Yes, the glass on the roof window is broken. And that's my line, Yugi.'

'Sure it is. I hate to be a downer, Yami, but I have a feeling we can't outrun these things forever.'

'We don't have to; we just need to get beyond the airport.'

'And that will help us… how exactly?'

'I have no idea, but at any rate we'll increase our numbers. Did you Joey?'

'I tried, there's no signal.' The car shudders a little but it's doing a lot better than it was when Yami was driving it and neither of them wonders about what they just ran over.

'We'll be safe for a while, so long as there aren't anymore of them. They might have given up the chase.' Yami lunges back up through the skylight as if in a bid to check on this statement. The wind has blasted out the tie keeping his hair both back and down, so now it's standing up again, the way Yugi's does and the way Yami's always used to back in the days when they shared a body. Yami goes to such pains to make them both look different, these days…

…Which is a really stupid thing to notice when you're driving at 100 kph on a pitch black freeway trying to keep a bunch of really fast, twisted looking, once-human creatures off your tailpipe, but Yugi notices it in spite of that. Sometimes, Yami's distinctiveness is pretty difficult to miss.

'Uh… you know, Yam, I think maybe you'd better move over and let me drive permanently here.'

'I… Yeah, Aibou, that might well be a wise suggestion…'

Yami yells back through the open skylight but his voice has turned cold and serious all over again.

When Yugi glances into the windshield, he can see the reason why. That reason is large, white, cloud shaped, and consists of perhaps three dozen once-human bodies, racing like the wind against the vehicle on the battered Vienna freeway.

'…I think I may need to stay on the roof.'

TBC…