The Rise and Fall of History II: Opposing the Present

by Medigo

The world of dueling has reached its climax. Many stories have been told through these cards, and the final story brought everyone together. People are united and yet, an unknown world suffers in their shadow. The fallen one returns in the midst of their peace, pursued and still a stranger to those around. There is not much time to save both his home and his friends.

50. Time for a Change of Pace

Redux 41: Time for a Change of Pace

"How can you do this?" The results of Marie Celeste's attack were clear; the fuses were blown and small fires erupted from the machines. "Oh it was easy, Alice Brandt. I studied their equipment at the castle and they have the exact same setup here. Just a little more sophisticated, but to me it might as well be a DOS-box." With knowledge like that, it was no small wonder that she knew which proverbial buttons to push. "Now I meant.. why did you?" Alice wondered if this meant the pendulums wouldnt be desynching anymore, if Uno was saved. Why would she want that? "To stop us. But it wont work! This can still be fixed!" Cassius defiantly shouted. "Whatever you say, Cassius."

Alice's LP: 7900 Cassius' LP: 3400

"I wasn't talking to you!" Cassius turned back to his field and flipped one of his traps. "I activate Re-Dyce-Cle! It resummons one speedroid tuner from the graveyard, with its effect negated!" He used that trap to special summon Speedroid Red-Eyed Dice(1/100/100). "Then it rolls one six-sided die to determine the tuners level. And if I do, Re-Dyce-cle can immediately synchronize the tuner with one monster I control, for a wind-type synchro monster!" Since Cassius controlled both HiSpeedroid Chanbara(5/2000/1000) and Speedroid Pachingo-Kart(4/1800/1000), he only needed to roll a two or three to summon Clear Wing. "Two!" And while he did get a desired result. "I synchro summon.. Stardust Charge Warrior!" The level-altered Red-Eye(2/100/100) was instead tuned with the lower leveled speedroid. Pachingo-Kart and the Dice synchronized into the jetwing dragon warior(6/2000/1300). Because Charge Warrior was synchro summoned, Cassius could draw one card. "Aaron.." Alice placed one trap card before she ended her turn.

"How many times are you going to make me say it? I am not just Aaron anymore.." He snapped at her. "I've buried some emotions.. Alice. There are memories of you that affect me, but there are also memories of a life without you." He took another card during his drawphase. "I was getting slower, you dull my reactions. So from now on, I will just focus on one me! And I will end this quickly so that I can return to lady Vesper! As long as she is maintaining the process in the other world, we can finish what we started!" He normal summoned a monster, Speedroid Double Yoyo(4/1400/1400). "Revive Speedroid Red-Eyed Dice!" The sawblade yoyo toy used its electric cords to drag the tuner(1/100/100) out of the graveyard. And with its no-longer negated effect, Red-Eye turned Double Yoyo(1/1400/1400) into its equal in levels. "The synchro tuner?" Alice remembered this dangerous strategy. "Formula Synchron!" Cassius tuned Red-Eyed Dice with Double Yoyo to synchro summon the racecar robot; Formula Synchron(2/200/1500). Its summon-activated effect gave Cassius another chance to draw.

"It's over." He had drawn a spell; Hi-Speed Re-Level. "I use this spell on Chanbara, and banish Pachingo Kart!" Hi-Speed Re-Level banished one speedroid from the graveyard, so that it could transfer the level to the other target and add 500 attackpoints for each of its new level stars. The spell charged Chanbara(4/4000/1000) four times. "Battle! Chanbara attacks directly!" Chanbara was fast, it could strike twice in one turn. And as Alice had no monsters on her field, that one monster was enough to decide the whole duel. "It still does not feel right..." Even now, with all of her anger gone, Alice did not want to give up. "I will.. use Forbidden Apocrypha and make it affect synchro monsters! Because you control more than one of them, I can return them all to your deck!" Her trap flipped and opened a forbidden book. "Oh, how devious." An impressed Celeste snickered. Cassius controlled three synchro monsters. He would lose everything he was attacking with. "I was expecting something like that, Alice!" Cassius answered in an instant. "I activate Urgent Tuning, and perform my Accel Synchro Summon!"

His last trap, Urgent Tuning, let him perform a synchro summon during his own battle phase. "Huh?" Formula Synchron the tuner tuned with the synchros Stardust Charge Warrior and HiSpeedroid Chanbara. "All twelve levels?" The fusion duelist was as stunned as Alice, as three synchro monsters joined into one divine many-winged white dragon(12/4000/4000). "Stardust Sifr Divine Dragon!" It was a dragon even greater than his golden Chronicle Stardust. "What happens if there is only one.. oh!" Forbidden Apocrypha could not resolve its effect if there were less than two synchro monsters on the field. Her trap fell into the graveyard without ever doing anything. Follow Wing was also destroyed at this point, since it didnt have its original target to protect anymore. Speaking of that card, Hi-Speedroid Chanbara had its final effect triggered upon its journey to the graveyard. It let Cassius reclaim one of his banished Speedroids; Bamboo Horse. "Stardust Sifr! Attack my opponent directly!" The divine dragon fired one massive beam at Alice. "Aaah!" She was engulfed in heavenly light, and lost half her life in one shot.

Alice's LP: 3900

"Stardust Sifr? You know for a second there, I thought you were going to summon something bigger. But then I remembered that you wouldnt know about it." Celeste looked disappointed. "What on earth are you talking about now?" Cassius growled. "There are a lot more stories that 'the first duelist' never told anyone; tales of battles against gods with the future of the world at stake. Powerful spirits awoke in those duels to defeat the evil forces etcetera etcetera. You know how it goes. That dragon of yours was based on one of those stories; a reincarnatation of the legendary quasars and blazers. The actual cards, with all of their original powers, was buried in Doms digital vaults. Until you helped us break his decryption." That was the end of her speech. "Are you thanking me or gloating at me?" Cassius had no idea why she even bothered to tell him. "Neither. I just wanted to tell you what you could have had if you hadn't betrayed us." She shrugged. "You knew we would, that is why you didn't return my other body to us right away. But I was willing to risk that! Enough of you. Alice it's your turn."

"Ah. Okay.." Alice could not keep up with their talks, her strength was still fading. "I will.. wait.. no.. I cant." Her hand still held the Brionac of Nekroz card. But there was one big reason not to use it. "Yes. The Divine Dragon can negate one monster effect each turn, and destroys one of your cards when it does. Even if you try to destroy it or any of my other cards, it can negate the destruction of those cards! Alice, there is nothing your monsters can do against this. You heard what that woman said, she is not going to make things better! Let me save what I can!" Cassius appealed to her emotions again. "I.." Alice could only do one thing. "I activate One Day of Peace." She used a spell that let both her and Cassius draw one card. "Now, neither us can take damage until my next turn. I set a card in my spell/trap zone. And.. end my turn." This way she was save from his attacks, despite her leaving a field with no defenses.

"You are just stalling now, Alice. You're good, just like your sister. But you also don't know when to stop.." He activated a spell card. "Necroid Synchro! I banish two nontuners and one tuner from the graveyard to use them as synchro materials for a Stardust monster! Come, Stardust Spark Dragon!" To give himself even more advantages, he banished Formula Synchron, Speedroid Ohajikid and Speedroid Terrortop. Seeing these eight levels, the extra deck released his other ace, the brilliant signer dragon(8/2500/2000) of the stars. "Another weaker copy." Celeste scoffed. "Weak or not, it does not change the fact that there is no way I can lose this duel!" He placed a monster face-down and ended his turn with those words. Was he right? Should she surrender? It seemed so easy. She could just put her hand on her deck and then let her body take over. She could rest. "I tried.." Her deck felt so heavy, her hand did not want to pull the next card. "But.." She wanted to do more, not just for her friends.. for Aaron too.

"Hey hey, dont tell me the show is ending already!"

"Uno?!" Alice heard him talk out of nowhere. That couldn't be good, she thought. If she was hearing voices, she really must have gotten delirious from exhaustion. "Fortuno Nisell!" Except, Cassius and Celeste were reacting to his words too. Were they having a shared hallucination? No, not that. "What's up!" It was Uno sitting in between the trio, on Vespers throne. "Uno? Am I... am I dreaming?" Alice could not believe it. "Nope. This is real and this is live!" Uno laughed as he casually plucked the crystal from the chair. "What!?... what is happening?" Celeste's visors and devices had no explanation for the scene taking place in front of her. "Sorry. I am not letting you ruin the show." Uno flicked his finger. "You did this? That shouldn't be possible!" She hissed. Somehow his return was disrupting her control of this facility. "Impossible? Nothing is impossible, MC!"

"No!" Cassius shouted. "Oh, you're going to disagree too?" Uno smirked at him. "Really, all I did was wake up and use Neters trick to get to my crystal. The pendulum and I.. and me? We're connected, so I cant ever lose track of it." Uno took out a new necklace, looped it through the crystal and hung it around his neck. "But you... Vesper is.. Your mind was desynched!" Cassius protested. "Was, yeah. I got better. I learned another trick. It's called having a clear mind. I am always synchronized with my body now, nothing can force me out. And its all thanks to the Sisters." He winked at Alice. "The sisters? You met them again?" She knew by now what he was talking about. "Huh? Sisters who?" Marie did not. And Cassius... "That nonsense again?" .. was still a nonbeliever. "What are you going to do now? Jump in to save Alice? I can take you both on!" He roared, getting increasingly frustrated. "What? No, I wouldn't think of it! I am just here to give her a little boost." He placed his hand on Alice's forehead. "Ehhh?" She flinched back. "Ooh.. what was that?" Suddenly she felt a lot more 'awake'. "I gave you some of my energy, so you can finish the duel. I know you can do it, Alice. I know the sisters helped you too."

"Oh.. Yeah, I forgot that too." She hadn't had a duel since her meeting with Veronica and Cloe. "It's my turn!" Maybe it was time for her to see the consequences of that. "I use my trap, Jar of Avarice! I have to return five cards from the graveyard to my deck!" Her greedy jar absorbed Vanity's Emptyness, Urgent Ritual Art, Forbidden Apocrypha, Nekroz of Clausolas and One Day of Peace. "Then I can draw one card!" A pulse ran through her veins as she took the next card from her deck. "!" It was a ritual monster, and it was not a Nekroz monster. "Also, I am going to activate Nekroz Mirror from my graveyard!" Since she controlled no monsters, the Mirror spell could banish itself and Nekroz Gungnir. "Now I can take a new Nekroz spell!" Her deck opened and she picked out Nekroz Cycle. "Stardust Sifr cannot negate continuous effects, can it?" She smiled when she played her spell. "Tch." Nekroz Cycle tributed the Dance Princess to re-ritual summon Nekroz of Unicore(4/2300/1600) from the graveyard. Unicore blocked the dragons powers, and Stardust Spark could not respond because Necroid Synchro negated the effects of the cards it summoned.

"I'll take back two cards now." Thanks to the effect of the tributed Dance Princess, the banished Nekroz of Gungnir returned. Thanks to the effect of Ascending Soul, she could put her tributed Princess back in her hand. "I summon Dance Princess again, and attack your two monsters!" The Dance Princess(4/1600/800) targeted the face-down Speedroid Denden Daiko Duke(3/1000/1000) with her ice magic and destroyed it. Nekroz of Unicore fired a spell as well, to break down Stardust Spark Dragon. "Alice.. what is this supposed to accomplish?" Cassius lost two of his monsters, but Stardust Sifr was still a big threat. "I just have to be sure you make the choice I like the most. When I summon my new monster.." She moved to the 2nd main phase. "I activate a ritual spell, Fairy's Blessing!" One more ritual took place and took the cards Nekroz of Gungnir and Relinkuriboh from Alice's hand as the sacrifices. thanks to Relinkuriboh, Alice could also draw one more card. But that was to be expected by now. "Eight levels?" What was unexpected was the monster Fairy's Blessing summoned. This spell could bring out any light-attribute ritual monster like Sauravis. "I summon Cyber Angel, Dakini!" Yet.. she summoned a four-armed blue-skinned deity(8/2700/2400).

"Cyber Angel?"" Celeste stammered. "Where did that come from?!" Celeste was yelling about it too. "That card is a class C lost asset! How did someone like you get a hold of it? Did the cardmaker give it to you?" She demanded an answer. "No. Three ladies did. They wanted me to keep telling their story." Alice said. "Nheh? Sisters?" The womans eye twitched. "Hmm, you know... I don't think you paid for these frontrow tickets, MC." Uno interjected. "You're gonna have to miss the rest of this performance" He raised his own dueldisk. "What? What are you doing? I coded into this network thanks to your own dueldisk.." If he wanted to remove her by shutting down his device, it was already too late. "Odd-Eyes." Instead he summoned a monster, Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon. "Attack!" The dragon released a blast at the woman. "Oh come on. I am a hologram, you can't.." And her words were smothered while her holographic form destabilized and broke apart. "There. Now its just us..."

"Yeah! Cassius, I wont lose now! When Dakini is summoned, you must send one monster on the field to the graveyard!" And there was only one monster to send now. "I have to do what?" The ritual summoned angel brandished two sabers with her upper arms. And Cassius' godly Stardust Sifr Dragon lost its head when both blades descended upon its neck. "My strongest.. dragon." There wasn't anything left now, while Alice controlled a full field. She placed one trap card down and ended her turn. "... during my endphase, Cyber Angel Dakini can put one ritual spell back in my hand. I will end my turn now then." Alice put Fairy's Blessing back in her hand. "Cassius isn't it time to stop this? Please? Uno is back, your plan wont work anymore." There was no reason to keep dueling. "Stop? It cannot stop.." Cassius drew his next card nonetheless and whispered to himself. "I cannot, and I cannot.. Guah!" He grabbed his head. "Aaron!?" She cried. Uno could not help but gasp as well. "He's .. how long has he been like this?"

"Since the duel started. Or before that. I don't know why." She said. Uno nodded. "I do. His synchronization is falling apart, he's worn two minds in one body for too long." This was the only body Cassius could work with, the Cassius from the other world had nowhere to go. "Cassius, I can help you." With his pendulum, the two could be desynched. "No! I refuse! I know your kind of help, but this synch will never break! It's the only future we have!" He drew his card. "I am Cassius, I am me!" He normal summoned the Speedroid Menko(4/100/2000). "I activate Stardust Sifr's final power!; resurrecting one Stardust monster from the grave!" The fallen Divine Dragon was exiled from the graveyard, while Stardust Spark Dragon(8/2500/2000) returned to his field. "And I am... I activate Denden Duke's effect too, to resummon Red-Eyed Dice!" Once again the lightning duke was banished from his grave, so that a tuner could live. Red-Eyed Dice came back to the field and used its levelchanging effect on Menko(6/100/2000). "Synchro summon! Clear Wing Synchro Dragon!" Menko and the Red die synchronized, and created the synchro counterpart(7/2500/2000) to Odd-Eyes. "The Circle will never fall!"

As if to undermine his statement, the entire cave began to rumble. "What was that?!" Uno apparently missed something. "Lady Vesper!" Cassius sensed the direction the shocks came from. "Uno, your sister.. she was here too. She's dueling Vesper." Alice quickly explained. "Ana?" She must have been causing those big noises. "No, if my lady is.." Cassius feared the worst. "Hang on, I will go and see whats going on. Alice, can you handle it from here?" He asked her. "I can!" She claimed. That was enough for him. "Okay!" He grabbed his crystal tightly and flashed out of the room.

...

Vesper's LP: 0

"Kgh." The mountains trembled as the last of Vespers lifepoints were thrown to the wind. Her mindreading ability never got a chance, not when her opponent could just activate a combo that overpowered everything she had in one turn. "From a member of the founding family, this is the power I would expect." The monster that defeated her was a massive planet-sized machine(10/8000/4000). It only took one shot and a Limiter Removal spell to double the monsters attackpower. "this is the power you were trying to seal. you did not have the right." Anastasia proclaimed as she stood in the shadow of her victory. "Wahoy!" That was the moment Uno arrived at, teleporting to the the middle of this crater. "Geez. you caused some damage here." Apparently Anastasia's last attack had caused all this smouldering wreckage. The attack came from the outside and tore a hole in the side of the mountain. Uno could see the sky, and a sphere that blocked out the sun. "uno!" His sister let out a cry of elation. "Nisell." Vesper breathed a grunt of revulsion. "Nice to see you both. You came all the way here for me, Ana? Thanks."

"Ana?" Anastasia gasped. "You remember?" He was using his nickname for her, he did do that before. "I remember everything, Ana. I remember what we really are. Why didn't you tell me, Ana? Why didn't you say the truth?" Uno remembered now, how his home was not his home. This world did not have the house he was born in, that place no longer existed. "i couldn't. I.." His sister knew, all this time. "But you didn't want to tell him, in front of his friends. You wanted him to remember it on his own, so he would become.. your brother again." And now Vesper knew, because she could read their minds. "You've finally turned back into the monster you once were, Fortuno. You have seen the way of your family. Keep everything hidden, keep it all to yourself." Even in defeat, the telepathic duelist did not tone down her disgust for these two. "No. I won't keep this. I am going to tell everyone. But.. I cannot do that until you've returned their minds." Uno walked up to her. "You will get nothing from me." Vesper spat. "I wanted to ask nicely, Vesper." He put up his crystal, which emitted a faint glow. "What? What is.." The light spread around the woman. "Desynchronization. You and your other self are going to spend the rest of your days, in one body."

"NO!"

(To be Continued in Redux 040: Will the Real Me please Stand Up?)

New Cards used by Alice Brandt
Cyber Angel Dakini

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One Day of Peace

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Forbidden Apocrypha

New Cards used by Cassius
Stardust Sifr Dragon

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Necroid Synchro

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Re-dyce-cle