"For someone who's working for Begia, I can't believe you're so willing to help me destroy the Fate cards." Michael turned to face Arlene. The two were slowly but surely formulating a plan of action, but they had taken a break to think about refining the plan by themselves before consulting each other. Michael had filled Arlene in on what he knew about Begia's plans, which was little - all that he knew was that large numbers of Begia members were travelling to Duel Academy. The two of them were silent for a few minutes before Michael spoke.

"Fate cards should never have been any part of Begia." He paused. "One day Mr. Ayver..."

"Mr. Ayver?" Arlene enquired. Michael gave a small nod.

"The leader of Begia. One day he...changed. He suddenly had the notion that Begia would be used to pass judgement on people. He somehow found a way to develop the Fate cards that would do so and started mass producing them."

"By using children from the families of Begia members. Did they really agree?" Michael gave a bitter laugh.

"Of course not. On the surface they had a choice, but if they refused they were killed by the Fate cards. Or, as we now know almost killed." Silence surrounded them as they walked.

"All of this doesn't seem real." Arlene stated after a few minutes. "My brother leaves for no good reason; I chase him to Duel Academy and then it blows up - twice; we finally meet then he gets infected by a card and now here the both of us are attempting to take down Begia all by ourselves. This could be a movie plot or something."

"You sound like you're having second thoughts." There was a pause. "All of this does seem farfetched, but we can't explain it away so lets concentrate on our other problem. We need more people."

"Isn't this food GREAT?" Adela stared down at the sloppy mess on her plate.

"Yeah, it's really...um..."

"WORDS AREN'T NEEDED!" Bryon declared happily and started scooping up his food. Adela stared out of the window of the fast food chain they were in. After a few minutes Bryon finished his food and looked out of the window as well. All of a sudden he sat up.

"LOOK WHO IT IS!" Bryon jumped up and down and pointed to a boy and a girl. Adela squinted her eyes.

"Who are they exactly?" Bryon ignored her and rushed out of the restaurant. Adela saw Bryon bear hugging the girl before dragging both of them inside to their table.

"Adela, this is Arlene and Michael! Michael and Arlene, Adela!" They inclined their heads to each other.

"What luck. Two more." Arlene stated. Adela frowned.

"Who more what exactly?" She asked, not liking the tone of Arlene's voice.

"That's the plan. Any questions?" The four had moved to a fairly quiet area of the city to discuss the plan.

"You're serious?" Adela asked. Arlene and Michael nodded. "You want the four of us to take down Begia?"

"Five. We're taking Fay with us." Arlene answered.

"Oh! Well that's a lot of use, isn't it?" Adela exploded. "Four teenagers and an unconscious girl! We have an idiotic plan that no-one seems to realise only works in the realms of your imaginations so of course we'll win against the bad guys! You all seem to be forgetting that Begia isn't just going to roll over and let you beat them! I've met Mr. Ayver, he's not a pushover, and neither is the rest of the organisation! I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm looking at this realistically and where I'm standing this whole thing sounds ridiculous!" Bryon looked stunned at her, but Arlene and Michael didn't seem fazed.

"I'm glad that you're thinking about this." Adela looked at Arlene suspiciously. "Adela, you're right. Under normal circumstances this would be a sure fire way to be killed. But don't you remember what's going on at Duel Academy right now? A lot of the organisation is on the island right now, which means that there will be less Begia members than there normally are to deal with us. And correct me if I'm wrong but Begia never had that many members to begin with anyway." Adela thought about this. "We'll be going there tomorrow, so you have all of today to change your mind. If you want to come with us, then meet here at sunrise."

It's hard to believe that I've come this far. Arlene felt the wind whipping through her hair as she stood beside the limp body of Fay. The others were lying on the ground in the alley, but Arlene did not believe for a moment that they were asleep. From barely entering Duel Academy to battling for my life and winning...but tomorrow...am I good enough? Am I good enough to duel Hamon Ayver? Michael told me that the only security they have is duelists with Fate cards. Works for us I guess, but it would be easier for them just to have guns and shoot us down! I guess Hamon believes that Begia should stop intruders their way. Hopefully by tomorrow Fay, Chester and Ethan will be back to normal...but then there's Duel Academy, being used by them for something. What if they're making more Fate cards there? I can only hope that when Hamon's brought down they'll stop.

This is ridiculous. Adela was facing away from the others, pretending to be asleep. I shouldn't even be considering this. It's suicide. Or would be if the guards were smart enough to use guns. As it stands we've actually got a good chance at this. That's probably why I'm going. So I'll be teaming up with Bryon to shut down the main computer thing. And Michael said I'd need my Duel Disk? To shut down a computer? This is crazy. And yet I'm going through with it.

Why? Michael thought to himself as he tried to sleep. Why am I caught up in this? If I hadn't lost then I wouldn't be going through with this. They told me they'd free my sister if I defeated enough people. All I wanted was revenge for Duel Academy turning its back on me, and Begia took my sister! They took her and plugged her in, and they're sucking away at her emotions! Tears started welling up in Michael's eyes. They wouldn't have released my sister if I kept going. They'd just use her to make me a puppet. That's why I'm going to set all of them free tomorrow. So that we can finally put all of this behind us...

Has Arlene forgiven me for what I did to her? Bryon was trying to lie as still as possible to keep up the pretence that he was asleep. I contributed to burning down the dorms, and she hated me for it. That's probably why I'm going with Adela instead tomorrow...Arlene can't have forgiven me enough yet. Maybe once everything is back to normal...if we can get through this and somehow get Duel Academy back to normal...

Hamon Ayver stared at one of the many large green tubes. Inside each one was a child, muttering in their sleep.

"It's funny how Fate works," Hamon thought aloud. " Who would have thought that I would be the one to help decide people's Fate? Who would have thought that Fate would throw an obstacle at me in the form of some teenagers and Erick Guerra? Couldn't get rid of him after I beat him of course, I'm not that inhumane. It wont be long until I can bury him." He paused as he watched the children. "Fate does love its theatrics. Children indeed!" He walked away.

Michael, Adela, Fay - supported by Bryon - and Arlene stood at the place they had agreed, all silently willing themselves to have courage. None of them spoke as they made their way to Begia.