Chapter Seven

Serenity was beside herself with worry. Her mother had insisted she eat something, so she was working her way through an English muffin with butter and jelly. But she kept glancing out the window, staring at the Spanish moss and other bizarre, out-of-place sights.

"Serenity, Dear, please slow down," Ms. Kawai sighed. "If you get indigestion, you won't be able to do anything to help. Not that I want you involved in this!"

"I'll be alright, Mom," Serenity insisted. She wasn't about to bring up that one of the Big Five had a grudge against her. "But Duke really should have been here by now. . . ."

"He must have been held up." Ms. Kawai couldn't fully hide the disapproval from her voice. She only allowed her daughter to associate with that boy because they hadn't got serious. And she had to admit that she had seen positive changes in Serenity's personality ever since she had met her brother's friends and become part of their group. But Serenity had also developed a rebellious streak. Ms. Kawai had been horrified when Serenity had finally revealed why she had insisted on going after Duke and David when they had needed to go to Egypt some time back. At the same time, she couldn't help being proud of her daughter for insisting on helping her friends in such a serious crisis—and for her previous, unselfish act in taking on all of the memories of Duke's pain and sorrow so that he could be happy again. Serenity was growing up.

"Well, he was going to get David first," Serenity mused, dragging the woman back to the present. "But still . . ." She sighed and fell silent.

"I'm sure he'll be here soon enough," Ms. Kawai said.

"Hey, Mom . . ." Serenity hesitated, then finally said, "Do you ever wonder what happened to Dad? I mean, where he went when he disappeared."

". . . I wonder about a lot of things regarding your father," Ms. Kawai admitted. "I never would have left him if he hadn't changed from the person I married."

Serenity nodded. "It's kind of sad. I mostly have good memories of him, but I have some bad ones too."

"I never wanted to leave your brother with him," Ms. Kawai said. "At that time, he was coherent enough that he hired a good lawyer who enforced his desire that we each have one of the children after the divorce. Your father was still a good parent then, so the judge allowed it."

"And then we never knew how bad things had got until we found out he'd gone missing," Serenity said softly. "Joey never wanted to say anything bad about him when we talked. . . ."

"Joseph always had a great deal of misplaced loyalty in that man," Ms. Kawai frowned. "The police assumed he had gone out on a drunken binge when he never came back."

"I know it still bothers Joey," Serenity said. "He goes out looking for him sometimes."

"I know," Ms. Kawai sighed. Movement outside the window caught her attention. "There's your friends now."

"Oh good." Serenity gathered up the rest of the muffin and stood. "I'll see you later, Mom!" She gave her a quick hug with one arm, a gesture that was returned.

"Just be careful," Ms. Kawai pleaded.

"I will!" Serenity waved and hurried out the door. "Hi, Duke, David! Tristan?!" She blinked in surprise at Tristan on his motorcycle.

"Hey." Tristan grinned and waved. "Thought I'd come along as a bodyguard."

Serenity smiled. "You're sweet, Tristan."

"Hey, Serenity," Duke smiled.

David got out of the car to let Serenity get in next to Duke. "Your mother's watching us like a hawk," he noted.

"Well, you can't blame her." Serenity climbed in and then David re-entered the car. "So what's the plan?"

"We've been trying to get in touch with Yugi and the others," Duke said. "No one's answering their phones. But my guess is that they're with Kaiba, so we should probably check there next."

"Sounds good to me," Serenity said. "Oh . . . I hope you don't mind about the muffin," she exclaimed. "I wasn't done eating yet. . . ."

"That's fine," Duke said. "I know you're careful." He made sure to drive off more normally than usual, both not wanting to jar her and not wanting to give her mother another scare.

"Actually," David realized, "I haven't eaten yet. And I'm sure you haven't, Duke."

"We don't really have time to stop for food breaks," Duke frowned. "Although . . . in a disaster like this, we might not get a chance to eat for hours after we really get involved in it."

"Exactly," David said. "And we'll need strength to fight off the Big Bad Five. So why don't we stop at a McDonald's or something and get some food to go?"

Duke shrugged. "Works for me."

xxxx

It wasn't long before Mai was speeding down the street in her bluish-purple convertible, her hair streaming out behind her. She still had her motorcycle and liked to ride it, but it was currently in storage. It was a reminder of the darkest point in her life, and when she was trying to make good, she thought it best to leave it behind for now.

Not that showing up in her car would make her seem any less threatening to the people she had hurt.

No one seemed to know what was behind the bizarre state of the city. There were a lot of bitter whispers—and some yells—of "Seto Kaiba," but Mai really didn't think it sounded like his style. More than likely, it was an enemy of his, if he had any connection with the mess at all.

A Baby Dragon chirped as it leaped on the hood of her car. She gasped, shocked, and swerved to the side. "Go on, shoo!" she exclaimed.

Instead, the dragon plopped in the passenger seat and pulled the seatbelt down.

Mai stared. Then, with a sigh and a resigned smirk, she brought a hand to her head. "Okay, but if you don't like car rides, out you go."

The dragon just chirped again.

Mai shook her head and pulled back into the lane. "Well, at least you remind me of Joey," she said. "I guess you don't know where he is, do you?"

A negative sound, and the dragon shook his head.

"Heh. You almost seem human," Mai said in bemusement. "Oh well. I guess stranger things have happened."

The next question was where to go to find everyone. They could be spread out, but it seemed more likely that they were mostly together. Maybe they would go to Seto Kaiba for answers. Unfortunately, probably most of the city had the same idea. It could prove almost impossible to get into KaibaCorp.

Would they go to the house? If they didn't know where it was, it would likely be easy enough to find out.

Maybe she should try to find out about it too. Or maybe she should try to find someone she knew who might not be with the others, like . . .

"Mai?!"

She looked up with a start. Valon was coming right towards her on his motorcycle. He pulled over to the side and leaped off. "Mai, it really is you!"

Mai pulled over too. "Yeah, it is."

She hesitated. Of course she wanted to apologize to Valon too, but she hadn't expected to run into him head-on like this. She had planned on time to prepare what to say. Now she had to find the words right away.

"Valon, I'm . . . I'm so sorry for how I treated you," she stammered. She got out of the car and started over to him. "The Orichalcos brought out the worst in me and emphasized it. For me, that was how I felt I had to be alone because people held me back. But it doesn't make me feel better that it was mainly the Orichalcos talking and not me. You were trying to help me, in your misguided way, and I completely rejected you. I am so sorry."

"Hey, it's alright, Mai," Valon said softly. "I know how the Orichalcos affects minds. And I know that deep down, you were probably also rejecting me because you still cared about Wheeler in spite of the Orichalcos."

Mai looked away. "Yes, that's true," she admitted.

"And I'm just glad to see you again, no matter what the reason is that you came back." Valon glanced to the Baby Dragon in the car. "I guess it's the city being turned upsidedown that did it?"

"No, actually," Mai quickly told him. "I got in last night, before any of this happened. I came back because I wanted to apologize to you and to Joey, and to anyone else I've hurt."

"And then what?" Valon asked. "Are you gonna stick around?"

"I think so," Mai said. "I started checking housing listings several days ago. But I wanted to wait to see everybody before I made a final decision."

"Why? You figure they'll reject you?" Valon frowned.

"I'm sure Joey won't," Mai said. "He never did, even when I was at my worst. He never gave up on me. . . ." She trailed off. "But I'm not so sure some of the others feel the same way."

"Well, I wouldn't know about that," Valon said. "But they forgave all these loonies what tried to conquer the world or take revenge or blow up the world, so why not you?"

"None of these others were their friends," Mai said softly. "I betrayed their trust. That's worse than any of the villains they didn't even know."

"I heard that Marik bloke pretended to be their friend for a while," Valon said.

"That's true," Mai conceded. "But I really was their friend, until . . ." She turned away.

"Hey, they forgave Wheeler when he got taken over by an evil force," Valon insisted. Then he flinched. "Oh. . . . You probably don't know about that. . . ."

Mai looked back to him with a start, her stomach knotting at the horrible news. "Joey?!" No, something like that couldn't happen to Joey! It couldn't! That was too cruel a fate for one so loyal and devoted to justice! She barreled on, half-unaware that her voice was rising in her panic. "When did that happen?! Is he alright?!"

"He's fine now," Valon assured her. "It was a few weeks ago. This organization called the Neo-Orichalcos started up and he got defeated by one of its members. Instead of having his soul stolen, the thing just took him over."

"No," Mai whispered. "I heard about the Neo-Orichalcos and wondered if I should look into it. Then I hesitated, wondering if it would bring up too many bad memories for me. And I hesitated so long that by the time I decided I had to look into it, they were already defeated."

"A good thing," Valon said. Not wanting to tell about the bikers' role in that misadventure, he said, "So, we're both tryin' to find out what's going on in town. How about we look into it together?"

"Well . . ." Mai glanced over Valon's shoulder as a blue sedan pulled up. Raphael and Alister were easily spotted inside, and both were giving her dark looks. "It looks like your friends are here now. Maybe teaming up wouldn't be such a hot idea."

"Eh?" Valon looked back as well. "Oh, once they know you're doing better, I'm sure everything will be okay, Mai."

Mai had to smile a bit in resignation. "Not everyone is as forgiving as you, Valon."

"I don't really forgive much," Valon said. "Not unless it's someone I really like."

The other bikers were getting out now. "Valon, what's going on?" Raphael demanded.

"Why is she here?" Alister frowned.

"Hey, it's alright," Valon protested. "Mai came back because she wanted to say she was sorry. I knew she would, someday."

"Yes, that's right," Mai said quietly. "I am deeply sorry. But I understand if you can't forgive the way I treated Valon."

"Not easily." Raphael glowered at her.

"Well . . ." Mai turned and hurried back to her car. "I think we'd better all focus on finding out what's happened to the city, and where everyone else is. I'll catch you boys later."

The Baby Dragon cheered, anxious to get back on the road.

"Mai . . . !" Valon called after her.

She looked to him. "I promise, I'll see you later, Valon." She gave him a sad smile before revving the engine and speeding past him and the other bikers.

Alister glowered after her. "That's all we need."

"Come on, you two," Valon protested. "You know she was poisoned by the Orichalcos, same as we were. And like how you were poisoned by the Neo-Orichalcos, Alister."

Alister flinched. Valon certainly had a point.

"You don't even know what she's like when she's in her normal mind," Valon continued.

"Alright, we'll give you that," Raphael said. "Yeah, I guess she deserves another chance. We just don't want her hurting you again."

"And I appreciate that." Valon climbed back on his motorcycle. "But right now, we probably should try to get to the bottom of this mess. Come on!" And he sped off.

Sighing, Raphael turned and headed back to the car. Alister wordlessly followed.

xxxx

Seto was not in a good mood as he fought Gansley. The last thing he had wanted was to see the Big Five again, and especially not with them taking over his game. No one else was allowed to duel alongside him, so they were trapped behind a clear barrier while the duel proceeded.

"If you've been around all this time, why didn't you come out before, you snake?" Seto demanded.

"We've certainly been observing you and everyone else," Gansley sneered. "But we had to devise the perfect plan for revenge. That only started to develop when you started developing your augmented reality game. We all knew it was ideal for our purposes! Not only could we ruin your invention, we could use it to give ourselves solid bodies in the real world."

Yami Bakura subconsciously laid a hand over the Infinity Ring. Either they didn't know the Ring could grant a mortal form to the wearer or they had wanted to use the game anyway since then they could each have a solid, albeit not mortal, form. But what would happen if they didn't know of the Ring's power and learned of it later?

Bakura rested a hand on his shoulder. It was a legitimate reason for concern. The more he thought of it, the more worried he grew. But he would try not to show it, for Yami Bakura's sake.

"And you've sure done that," Seto said in disgust. "Now you're planning to commit murder in order to get what you want."

"Oh, I wouldn't put it quite like that," Gansley said. "It's more that the rules of our new game will not be kind to anyone who fails."

"Anything to absolve yourselves of the charges," Seto said. "But I'm pretty sure the police will still consider it murder."

"They're so unimaginative, naturally they would," Gansley said. "As far as we're concerned, we're ridding ourselves of all of you without personally dirtying our hands with your blood."

"That's sick!" Mokuba cried.

"You big sleaze!" Joey yelled, shaking a fist. "Crush him, Kaiba!"

Seto drew his next card. "I'm going to." Frankly, so far the duel had been far too easy. Gansley's monsters were weak, but he considered them valuable because of their various special effects, such as preventing Seto from drawing on his next turn or preventing him from attacking. But without his Deckmaster system, he hadn't been able to block all of Seto's attacks, and Seto had gotten in a couple of good hits. Now he had to wonder if Gansley's deck was really this pathetic or if he was falling into a trap. Knowing the Big Five, it was probably the latter. But he had no choice other than to press on, since surrender was not an option. "Alright, Gansley. You asked for it! Now, feel the rage of my Vorse Raider! Attack his face-down monster!"

Gansley sneered. "Exactly as I planned. All I have to do is discard one card from my hand and my monster flips up and automatically destroys your monster before it destroys mine!"

Seto stiffened. "No!"

"Now what's he going to do?!" Téa gasped.

"Luckily, that effect only works once," Yugi said. "It's actually another weak monster. Kaiba just needs to draw another of his monsters and he should be able to destroy it!"

"But it won't damage Gansley's lifepoints since it's in defense position," Atem frowned.

"That would depend on if Kaiba has any cards in his deck that can deal out damage even if the card is in defense mode," Yami Bakura pointed out.

"Oh yeah," Joey blinked. "You've got one of those kind. They sure are tough customers."

Gansley just sneered. "I will place this card face-down, and that is all for now."

Seto frowned. That was certainly suspicious. He would also lay a card face-down before attacking again. As he drew a new card, he started to smirk.

"Alright, Gansley! This ends here!" he proclaimed. "First I'll lay this monster face-down. Then I'll place another card face-down and attack with my Battle Ox!"

"Of course you will. And of course you'll fail!" Gansley said in delight. "Mirror Wall!"

"Oh no!" Téa cried. "It'll block his attack and he'll take half the damage when his monster's attack power is cut in half!"

"Or not. Reveal face-down card! Remove Trap!" Seto gave a sweeping gesture and the card hologram flipped up. "Your Mirror Wall's gone, Gansley. My attack goes through. And now that you're defenseless, I can do this. My other monster card is Kaibaman."

Everyone stared as the strange card flipped up.

"Kaibaman?" Joey blinked. "What the heck? It looks like Kaiba, wearin' a helmet and long hair."

Gansley was terribly amused. "Such a weak monster! You surely aren't going to launch a direct attack with that! Why, Pegasus must have created that card to insult you!"

"Actually, he gave it to me as a gift," Seto said. "It'll make sense when you see its special ability. Kaibaman lets me special summon a Blue Eyes White Dragon without sacrificing other monsters to get it on the field!"

Now Gansley was no longer amused. "What?! You can't!"

"Pegasus says I can," Seto smirked. "So, go, Kaibaman! Summon the mighty Blue Eyes White Dragon!"

In a moment the beast appeared, its roar echoing off all the nearby buildings. Gansley took a step back, staring at it in horror. "I have nothing left to protect myself!"

"I know. Blue Eyes White Dragon! White Lightning Attack!" Seto watched with relish as the rest of Gansley's lifepoints dropped to zero. "And that's game over."

Gansley fell backwards to the ground. Glowering at Seto with hate-filled eyes, he grabbed his cane and got back up. "For now, perhaps. But you have a long way to go before you're safe, Seto Kaiba." And he vanished.

The barrier shimmered and disappeared as well, allowing everyone else to run out onto the field.

"Big brother!" Of course, Mokuba was first. He ran right to Seto and hugged him. Seto returned the embrace.

"Wow, that was an awesome duel!" Yugi exclaimed. "When did Pegasus give you that card, Kaiba?"

"When he showed up to apologize," Seto said. "This was my first time trying it out in an official duel. I'd say it's a keeper."

"No kidding!" Joey said. "It sure saved all of us this time! I don't wanna know what happens if you lose a duel here!"

"Me either," Téa shuddered. "Maybe it's an automatic death, for real. So now what?"

"We keep going, like Gansley said," Seto said. "We're not out of his section yet."

"I hope nothing else will go wrong," Téa said, although she knew it was likely a futile hope.

None of them were aware that they were being observed on a viewscreen by all of the Big Five. The demented men were sitting at a conference table in their current office, planning and plotting for what would come next. Crump sneered. "Oh, don't worry, Téa. Everything else will go wrong, soon enough!"

Lector glowered at Gansley as he joined them. "You let Seto Kaiba defeat you!" he cried.

"I didn't know he had some new way of summoning his precious dragon," Gansley retorted. "But that doesn't matter. We all knew they might defeat us in the first rounds. If anything, it will give them more confidence. Then we will have all the more satisfaction when we bring it to the ground!"

"One thing I've noticed," Johnson said. "If we want to get to the Infinity Item bearers, we must go through the people they care about most."

"Yes, we all agreed it would be important to get them out of the way," Gansley said. "They will be our most powerful opponents. Although apparently not even their ancient magic can save them from our game!"

"Did you really believe magic would be more powerful than technology?" Nesbitt scoffed. "Negative!"

"You're still talking like a robot," Lector snorted. "Did you ever stop to think about the irony that while you're goin' on about how superior machines are to men, it was humans who created them? How does that make them superior?"

"At least they don't have humans' weaknesses," Nesbitt insisted.

"Maybe not, but they sure have plenty of weaknesses of their own," Lector said. "When was the last time you fought with a computer that refused to do what it was told?"

"Computers always do what they're told," Nesbitt said. "It's just that humans don't always know the right instructions to give them!"

"Alright, enough of this!" Gansley interrupted. "We have more important things to worry about. Such as exactly how we're going to devastate the item holders."

"I've done some research that could prove very valuable," Crump spoke up.

"Well, then by all means, do tell," Johnson said.

"I say that we should focus on the weakest link first," Crump said. "Of the two item holders, the Pharaoh has already conquered his darkness and fully earned his second chance. It will probably be much more difficult to get him to give in to his rage. The other man, meanwhile, is, shall we say, on probation. His item lets him stay mortal, but only if he plays nice. But if something were to go drastically wrong and he decided to use his item for purposes that would be frowned on, it will turn on him and he'll be completely incinerated by it!"

"Hmm." Johnson's eyes gleamed. "This is useful information. But what would push him to that point?"

Gansley laced his fingers. "The answer is obvious. We all saw how tightly he held on to that boy, even while they were being tossed about in our underwater tornado. Harm the boy, and he will snap."

"We need to get rid of the boy anyway," Johnson said. "But what do you suggest we do?"

"Whatever you deem the cruelest, most foul end," Gansley sneered. "They'll be out of my section soon, and they're heading for yours. Since you chose the great outdoors for your section, I'm certain you can find countless dangers to befall them. One of them can take his life."

"But wait just a minute," Lector interjected. "If that man goes berserk, don't you realize that he'll be comin' after us?!"

"Don't you realize we can't be harmed?" Gansley laughed. "These bodies are solid, but not mortal. He can come after us all he wants. Anyway, if he uses his Ring to act out of sheer hatred, he will be gone before he can do much of any damage to us."

"I suppose you're right," Lector said slowly. "But I'm not sure I like this. From things we've observed, we know that man is dangerous even while he's in his right mind. If we make him completely lose control, it could easily backfire on us."

"It won't," Gansley insisted.

"Don't forget, that boy is friends with Yugi and all the rest," Johnson said. "They'll get angry too. We might not have the resources to contend with all of them, if they all decide to avenge his death."

"Try taking out more than one of them," Gansley sneered. "They're all supposed to die eventually."

"Why don't you try taking some of them out?" Johnson countered. "They are still in your territory. And I'm sure that once you remove Seto Kaiba's fail-safes, you can command a shark or a sea serpent to do some devastating damage that will be real."

"That's a good point," Gansley agreed. "I believe I will. But meanwhile, Johnson, see what deathtraps you can come up with for your section. In fact, all of you should! It's time to take our game up several notches, especially now that we have more people intending to play." He nodded to several other viewscreens suspended in the air.

"These people I don't recognize," Johnson complained, noting the bikers.

"I remember that woman," Crump said, pointing out Mai in her car. "She was a victim the very first time we tried to use virtual reality to ruin Mr. Kaiba."

"I remember her too," Johnson said. "Joseph Wheeler was very fond of her."

"We should be able to do something with that," Gansley sneered. "Yes, we'll target various loved ones of this unfortunate group, reducing their number and leaving the remainder far more vulnerable to attack! It's the perfect plan!"

No one disagreed.