Yu-Gi-Oh 5Ds: The Judgement of the World

Written By: Lady Lunar Phoenix

Beta By: Lady Lunar Phoenix

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Asukas' frazzled nerves ignited once more in alarm as she suddenly found herself unable to drink. The water which had been flowing easily through the plastic straw into her mouth suddenly stopped. Instinct made her suck on the straw harder in fear that the problem lied with her. But there was no sense of movement in the large mug, while her already frazzled awareness took a panicked note of the sudden silence of the hospital. Fear and anxiety buzzed along her skin, sending the hairs standing up.

Panic started to grip her as she looked to her brothers' bed in mounting fear. Fubuki blinking at her sudden action in alarm.

"Sis?"

Seeing him look at her in pure worry was a relief to Asuka. Seeing him moving, and that she could hear him speak was a comfort unto itself, but there was no outside noise. She studied the door leading to the hospital in her own silence for a moment. There was no sounds of footfalls or distant conversations, the faint sounds of a television was also absent. All the sounds she had been growing accustomed to during her stay was now painfully gone.

"Fubu..." cut off from acknowledging her brother Asuka had turned to face her brother when a familiar, and entirely intimidating, woman could be seen now in the room with them.

This time she wasn't alone either, as a guy stood there in white robes, his face half hidden by a lower face mask, with the same fabric draped over his hair and held in place by a crown of gold.

Fubuki blinked at her reaction and turned to see where she was staring even as the back of his mind noted the sudden silence beyond the room. "Hello?" The curtain at the foot of his bed had been kept pulled out to help him rest by obstructing the sunlight. But it also kept him from seeing whoever was there from the shins up. But he 'could' see a pair of stylish matted black boots and the shadow of people.

"You can, uh..." Asuka asked glancing at her brother before looking back at their sudden 'guests'.

"You stand in the presence of my Lady Pharaoh, though She was given the name 'Kara' in her modern incarnation," the guy in the white robes answered calmly.

"Umm so an alternate Yugi?" Fubuki asked, his voice almost strangled into silence by apprehension.

"Well we don't all have the same names," Kara answered with a slight shrug. "I think there have been..." She leaned her head back and closed her eyes as she tried to remember, "some odd 15 plus 'Yugi' versions of me." She pushed off from the wall and strode into the room, placing herself between the two beds. "And because he didn't introduce himself, 'again'." She sighed casting a glance over her shoulder.

But the smile she gave was one of gentle amusement and good humor, the first that Asuka had seen on the woman yet.

"That would be my faithful Magician, though you know him as the 'Dark Magician' in these realities."

Mahaado bowed his head with a slight sigh, "my apologies My Lady, once more I have forgotten your dislike of my state."

"Its only all of us who dislike it," She replied before turning the intensity of her focus back onto Asuka. "But back to business. I made copies of your duel spirits and gave instruction to my followers. From what I've seen before I arrived, Aki will be arriving here to see to things as well."

Fubuki sounded pitiful off on his own hospital bed. "Were you friends with Mr. Jounouchi?"

'Oh there it is,' she realized before shaking her head. "No, we all have our own groups of friends, some cross over sure. But mostly we have different people. I didn't have a gambler/warrior deck carrying friend."

"Oh... that... umm..." Fubuki stared at his hands for a moment before daring to look up.

"I realize my Lady gives off a stern air, but She must as She is a ruler, if you wish to speak you may do so. Especially here in a house of healing," Mahaado offered as Graceful Dices' copy appeared.

It manifested between Mahaado and Fubuki, for a moment it merely looked around in a state of confusion. But then it flew over to Fubuki and settled on the bed next to him. Devil Dice and Cyber Tutu appeared next, then Blader, and soon the others were materializing as well.

"Tutu..." Asuka choked as she saw the Spirit and her arms opened immediately, confusing the dancing spirit. But Tutu came over, taking Asuka's hands in her own in her expression a mixture of concern and confusion.

Cowed in a way none had seen, Djinn began slinking out of the room. Keeping a worried eye on 'Kara' as she moved, Cyber Phoenix and the others moved off as well. Fairly peeking out of the door before dashing out, undoubtedly drawn to the sensations of their decks.

"I'm sorry..." Asuka whimpered as she crawled to the very edge of her bed and hid her face against Tutu's shoulder.

"Ms... Uh... Lady?"

Hearing Fubuki, the one who spoke so easily with the girls at school, stumble over how to talk to their 'guest' was not comforting.

Kara shot her Mahaado a look, which earned her a half eyed lean back from him. That quiet 'I have an answer but you don't like that answer', reaction that came so naturally Fubuki could only assume it was.

"What is this mask, why is it still with me?" Fubuki asked, he got out of his bed and made his way to his bags. There was this weight to his deck that startled him for a moment, almost enough to make him drop it in his surprise. But he finally lifted it up and rooted around among the cards, quickly he found the Red Eyes Black Dragon mask.

Kara moved back so she was leaning against his bed before shrugging, looking over at her Mahaado. "Its a spell card."

"Ahh..." Mahaado noted the look he got from the young man before shrugging. "You need to understand that my Lady and all Her counterparts live with a restriction on the words They speak. Be it to mortals like yourself. Theirs is the Words of Power, and can reshape reality in an instant. Free Will revoked, fortunes negated, in short, it would be best if I explain rather than She."

"The Mask in question did not start out in the shape currently in your hands." Mahaado began even as he walked over and held out his hand expectantly.

Fubuki, already pale and nervous, placed the card in the magicians' hands as several of the spirits moved to either of his side. Close enough that he felt the weight of their presence and comforted by it.

"Ah, yes, I know of this mask. The spell itself starts simply as a mask, featureless and without power. It was imbued by who I know not. But they imparted the powers of the Red Eyes Black Dragons. These masks serve as a type of intermediary tool, in this case, empowering the wearing to understand the speech of dragons. Undoubtedly, also allowing you to see us spirits when worn..."

"So its not evil?" Asuka asked as she got back properly into her seat, grateful that the Magician had arrived. His eyes were kind and understanding, and he spoke in a manner like a teacher which helped make her feel more like she was in class. And not being faced by a divine being who could apparently rewrite reality.

"No, rather, it was shaped for dragons, and therefore feels of they and their kin. For one such as yourself with no such affinity I can imagine it must be formidable to face such power. More over, I can tell that there is a..." Mahaado's head tilted a bit to the side as though he was momentarily listening to something internally.

"There is something here... a taint of sorts, but it is not a part of the mask... rather because Red Eyes is a Dark Dragon its the corruption you sense. The mask would serve you well in detecting the corruption of the land. But it would ultimately become a threat to you as you are now, so I would refrain from using the mask carelessly. At least until such time as you have developed a strong enough bond with Red Eyes."

"Oh... ok good to know... I was wondering because I've worn this mask for so long and I guess I'm a bit scared of it now."

"Ah... You were the one young Honest spoke of then?" Mahaado asked politely as he studied the young man's aura. There were fractures and cracks that ran along the young man's spirit, given what the young spirit spoke of...

"Heh, yeah wait... Is he alive?" Fubuki tilted his head a bit to indicate the spirits around him and was rewarded with a slight nod.

"Ah yes, and he did a bit of hypnosis on people to hide his faerie nature... I suppose he'll have to fix all that when he is strong enough to return on his own." Mahaado noted with a faint smile that was hidden by his face mask.

"He was just trying to save his partner, and if I was a better duelist," Fubuki countered with a shake of his head before slipping the card back into his deck. "So how does the mask work? I'm not like Aki."

"You should be able to call it forth as you are now..." Mahaado pointed out before catching himself with understanding. "Your world doesn't have magic does it? Or at least not actively."

"Yours does?" Fubuki blinked and stood staring at Mahaado in awe while the magician looked between Fubuki and Kara.

"The closest they have are the Psychic duelists like Aki at this point," Kara explained. Her gaze drifted over to Asuka before she shrugged. "Your friend... There are spirits being sought out to help her..."

"Ahh the girl, forgive me, allow me to attend to her now," Mahaado bowed and walked out of the room.

"He... I didn't know Dark Magician could heal..." Asuka clutched at Tutu's hands as she watched the magician until his robes disappeared out of sight. Tutu's hands were as she remembered, a strange lack of warmth but still solid and gentle.

Kara chuckled before shaking her head, 'you need to learn to pay attention child. You were told where spell cards came from. Is it so surprising that he has potion recipes in his spellbook? Even his spellbook itself can heal.'

"Lady Kara?" Fubuki was pulling on his hospital robe and tying it as he spoke, his tone quiet while his gaze was affixed on the spirits on his bed. "Thank you for bringing back our Spirits. You're not our Yugi, and I don't know how I would face him if. If they were dead..."

"Uh what? Dead? No we're here..." Tutu answered turned from Asuka to look at Fubuki. But his expression, even the one on Kara's face filled her with dread. "Wait, we are... we haven't..."

Panic began to settle in as she looked at Asuka and the fresh wave of tears that fell from her partners' face. "Asuka, we're not..."

It was in how both Asuka and Fubuki looked away in shame or grief from Tutu, how Asuka was physically shaking in the bed. Blader had been alarmed when she had found herself distant from the battle site half hanging half standing before the Goddess of their world. That She was their deity there was no mistaking. Blader knew they had a God, a male entity who created their world, but this woman still felt the same as the stories. This incredible power that just made her straighten up and try to not disappoint.

And She was looking at Blader, with this calm, regal manner...

Bladers' hand shamefully shook as she pointed towards the door, "they're alive too right? We're alive... We were pulled aside by the Goddess, she healed our injuries... but they were just..." Blader recounted before dropping her arm to her side in growing alarm as she looked about. Kara merely shrugged, as indifferent now as when She pulled them aside...

"I replicated you, the original yous died to protect your humans. What you have now are new forms to house your developing identities, so you could return to them like this. You can think of yourselves whatever way you want."

It was a strange flat sentence, cut off in a way that Blader didn't understand, but in the back of her mind she remembered. The Dark Magician said She couldn't say anything without making it reality, so whatever the Goddess was about to say, could have warped their reality in some manner? Blader sagged back against the wall, covering her mouth with her hands as the shock finally hit.

They had all died. Not in the 'go to a graveyard and wait around for a bit to be released when the duel is over'. They had... stopped... 'I remember when I started thinking, the moment that... that spark of life came to me... to go back...'

"Asuka?"

"Fubuki?"

"Our carelessness cost you your lives... And we're so sorry..." Asuka choked on a fresh wave of tears. Blader wasn't like Tutu, not entirely a chatty person, but when she spoke it was often with weight, like Ryo, responsible and in charge. Now she sounded so scared, as young as a child confronted by the unknown. "And I just didn't want you to die..."

"What is death though? We came from the imagination of people and given life by people like you... What happens when a product dies?"

"The same thing that happens when people die," Kara replied flat and unamused. "I don't treat you any worse or better than I treat a human, a plant, an animal or a star system. All were created via choice, your actions are your own. For good or for bad, and I won't pass Final Judgement until you're dead and brought before me." She shrugged then shifted Her posture slightly, "its just the route that humans take is different than spirits."

"How are you here then?" Fubuki asked floored and earned himself a smirk of an answer.

"Ahh the injuries are quite potent."

Kara had been about to answer when Mahaado's voice interrupted them, walking back into the room, a large tome in his arms. But his eyes expressed a worry that was also in his voice, "when you spoke of the injuries I had not expected such severity."

"Who got hurt?" Graceful meekly asked, its face, already pretty featureless, hidden behind the dice it held.

"The men will recover, it is merely the burns of flesh on metal. But I fear for both women," Mahaado explained even as he shook his head. "The other burns were from the metal of their spirits super heated into causing it. The women were burned almost directly by this corrupt flame. I was going to just apply my potions to their drinks. It was my hope to ease their discomfort until the healers arrived." Mahaado shook his head as the weight of what he was saying, that it wasn't just Momoe it was Junko as well...

"I felt it necessary to use my full array..."

"Junko too? I-I mean.." Asuka's guilt made her turn white and Mahaado turned his gaze towards her in sympathy.

"She was fortunate that the injury was not directly to her head, but it is just as bad. I believe that there have been medicines applied to her that have, for now, dulled the pain. My potions and spells will reinforce that, and rebuild what was taken. But I am not of this reality, nor is healing the area of expertise that they desperately need. They need Set, or a means to reach your Pharaoh and win His favor. That He may heal them of their pain, Set would be the easier choice-," Mahaado was cut off by the amused snort that came from Kara.

Earning Her his reproachful gaze, "I admit Set is difficult, but he has a heart to the suffering of others."

"I know... but he's such a brat," Kara admitted before shaking her head. Turning once more to look at the pair of living humans she straightened up. "I've done my part, the rest will be revealed when Aki arrives." With that She was gone, as simple as a blink of an eye. Leaving the spirits invisible and the siblings at a loss.