Because of Recklessness
Summary: One thoughtless act can change everything. Hugo's charge prevents Joeri from kidnapping Rin but that is only the start of their troubles.
Based on the prompt from GenderbendShapeShifter.
All other requested/prompted fics will also be titled "Because" instead of "Not".
{~~~}
Hugo knew that he could be reckless. Rin had badgered his millions of times to stay focused, to not let his emotions get the better of him.
They both knew that a focused Hugo was a smart Hugo and a smart Hugo was a force to be reckoned with. All he needed to do was to stay calm and think.
But he couldn't think. Not with Rin slung over a grinning bastard's shoulder.
Hugo was reckless.
'Violet Fl-"
"Where do you think you're taking Rin, you bastard?!"
And so he charged.
There was a flash.
The alley was empty.
And so a new course was set for the pendulum of fate.
{~~~}
Rin had no idea where she was but it was definitely nowhere in the City, Tops or Commons. There was no way it could be the City.
The sky was coloured ash grey. The air was musty with a distinct smell of metal and gunpowder. Everything was in ruins, no building was whole. Broken windows, collapsed walls and rubble littering the street… it was the perfect picture of the end.
Rin desperately hoped that this was another place, another world, another dimension…anything except their future.
She was alone. Their D-Wheel was here, Hugo's deck too, but no sign of Hugo or that evil bastard of a lookalike.
Rin mounted their D-Wheel and revved the engine. Good, at least it still worked. The rumble of their hard work calmed her. It was familiar, a safety net in this alien world, and she lost herself in the sound as images of destruction blurred around her.
Had she passed anyone? Who knows, who cares. There was no way that this could be real. It had to dream, a twisted nightmare. Maybe if she drove far enough, fast enough, she would wake up in her room back in the City Commons, Hugo snoring in the next bed over and their D-Wheel stowed away in the garage.
Yes, Rin could hear their caretaker calling for them, it was their turn to help with breakfast after all. Hugo's snores were ridiculously loud but he was a light sleeper. He would be the first to wake up. His snores would come to a sudden stop and he would moan and splutter as he stumbled out of bed. Maybe he would get tangled in his blanket and fall onto the floor. If the proceeding thump hadn't woken her up, she could count of a more conscious Hugo to.
"Rin!"
"Rin!"
"Rin!"
Her eyes fluttered shut, she would be home again and this weird dream of kidnappers and wasted cities would soon be over.
But someone stumbled onto the road.
Rin's eyes flicked open and she brought the D-Wheel to a screeching halt.
She was still in these ruins. She had nearly run someone over. This was real.
The engine died and she slumped over the duel console.
Rin had duelled an evil Hugo who used an unknown summoning method called 'fusion'. She had lost. Hugo had tried to rescue her. Both boys had disappeared. She was alone and had no idea where she was.
"Are…are you okay?"
She looked up, wiping away half formed tears. It was the person she almost ran over. Someone about her age, she guessed, dressed in tattered jeans and a green polo. A grey cloak was over his shoulders and his face hidden by a mask and goggles.
While to her the boy was someone completely foreign, there was a spark of recognition behind the glass.
"Ruri?"
What?
"Ruri...you're alive..." The boy's voice was quiet, filled with hope and disbelief. "You're alive." He reaches out and brushes his hand against her cheek. "You're real, you're alive..."
The boy stumbled into Rin, catching her in a clumsy hug. He sobs into her shoulder and said no more.
The sheer amount of relief and joy flowing from the boy made Rin wish that she actually was this 'Ruri', less shatter his hope. But she wasn't Ruri, she was Rin and this wasn't her world.
She grabbed the boy by his shoulders and gently pushed him off her. His goggles are half filled with water, implying that he'd been crying.
"I'm sorry..." Rin said.
The boy flinched and backed away, already predicting what she was going to say. "No..." he muttered.
"I'm not Ruri."
"But...but you have to be." He said, faint and desperate. "I know what Ruri looks like...we've known each other for years..." His stance rocked as if he couldn't decide whether to step forward or back. "You have to be her..."
Rin wanted to comfort him, maybe even lie and say she was Ruri, but in circumstances like this a mistaken identity would only get her into more trouble. "I'm sorry but I don't know you. I've never seen you before in my life..."
"But you have!" And the boy tears off his mask and goggles, tears streaming down his face...a face she knew all too well.
"Hugo?" the name fell out instinctively. She would have thought so too if it weren't for the near kidnapping only moments ago.
The boy's face darkened and his feet steadied. "Yuugou..." he snarled.
Rin huffed. "Yuugo not Yuugou." It was a common mistake that often sent Hugo ranting and she herself had gotten into the habit of correcting.
"Yuugou... did this to you..." he raised his duel disk arm, crouching in an offensive stance.
Rin sat up, properly mounting their D-Wheel. "Yuugo did nothing to me." She didn't have her own deck but she had Hugo's. She would have to knock some sense into this lookalike.
"I'm sorry Ruri..."
With a single swipe, both duel disks activated.
"DUEL!"
{~~~}
For an evil kidnapping bastard, his lookalike could hold himself in hand-to-hand combat. He was decent even. He moved with a skill and elegance that just screamed Tops, not the snooty kind that always wore fancy clothes and stuff but the kind that earned their place at the top of the social ladder. Had this been any other time, Hugo would be begging the guy teach him some of his techniques. Instead, he just threw another punch at that grinning face.
The bastard dodged with ease before sweeping at Hugo's legs. He leapt over it and ducked an oncoming fist that anticipated his move before retaliating with a punch to his opponent's chest. Hugo stumbled back as the lookalike flipped out of his range, landing gracefully a couple metres away.
"Ne, you're good…for Synchro scum." He said.
"Shut it, you bastard!" Hugo said, charging at him.
The other simply sidestepped out of his path before tripping him over a booted foot.
One snarled while the other laughed.
"You are so entertaining. If only I could keep you, we could have so much fun…but sadly…" His lookalike activated his shield-like duel disk, producing a holographic blade. "I have a job to do."
Hugo scrambled to his feet and took several steps back. He could hold his own in a fist fight but against Solid Vision?
No way, not without a deck and duel disk of him own.
Hugo was reckless, but not stupid.
He ran just as his doppelganger drew several cards. His best bet for survival now was to get the hell away before something deadly was summoned. Besides he had the field advantage. Hugo knew the City Commons like the back of his hand, he had to if he wasn't going to get caught by Security.
But then he ran into a canal.
There were no canals in the Commons.
There were no canals in the City period.
So why was there flowing water where there should be cracked pavement?!
For the first time since he charged at his lookalike, Hugo took a good look at his surroundings. There were buildings but they weren't as slick or tall or as many, only reaching a couple stories high in a rural style he had only seen picture books. The road was well paved with stone bricks and the sky was so blue, no smogs of pollution in sight.
Where in the world was he?
Steady footsteps alerted him that someone was coming. Hugo turned and saw his smug bastard of a counterpart stalking towards him, a cruel grin on his face and a monstrous purple dragon in tow.
If only he had Clear Wing.
Hugo prepared himself for any banter the bastard had ready but no words were traded. Only a slick tail slamming into him, feeling too solid to just be a hologram, knocking him into the brick wall across the canal. He crumpled on contact and fell into the water.
Hugo tried to maintain his grip on consciousness but his chest hurt. He had to have a broken rib or two, maybe even a dislocated shoulder or something.
As his mind began to flicker and sight blur, Hugo felt someone dragging him out of the water. He tried spluttering but his entire body felt limp. He then saw a face, cold and emotionless, but a face he knew all too well.
"Rin…" he muttered as he fell into darkness.
{~~~}
"Spread those beautiful wings and take flight! Synchro summon…level seven! Clear Wing Synchro Dragon!"
Ute watched as his opponent's two monsters disappeared in a flurry of rings and a beam of light, replaced by the white dragon glaring down at him. The monster didn't come from her hand, graveyard or main deck but rather her xyz deck but that was no xyz monster. Its materials were a level three and a level four while the dragon itself still had a level instead of a rank. The card on her duel-disk-motorcycle contraption was also white instead of black.
This was the Academia and fusion all over again.
"How…how in the world did you do that?" Ute said while checking his field for any way to counter the new monster. A twenty-five hundred attacker would be able to run over his Phantom Knights of the Break Sword with no problem. "Is this Yuugou's new weapon?"
The girl shot him a confused look. "New weapon? Synchro summoning has been around for ages." At his own confusion she sighed. "With a tuner and non-tuner monster, you can special summon a monster from the synchro deck whose levels is equal to the sum of the materials…and for the last time, it's Yuugo not Yuugou!"
As much as it pained him, this girl wasn't Ruri. He had noticed the inconsistencies earlier but he didn't want to acknowledge them. Her hair was shorter, her speech was rougher and she lacked the bird-like grace in her movement. Ute would have admitted his mistake but the lookalike's adamant defence for fusion meant that she had to be Academia.
And Academia could call forth another new type of monster.
"Clear Wing, attack Break Sword… Spin Storm Strike!"
The dragon rammed into his knight and with his other Phantom Knights already banished, Ute could do nothing but watch as the monster was destroyed. His lifepoints fell by five hundred points while duel disk beeped, alerting him of the timing for Break Sword's effect.
"When Break Sword is destroyed, I can special summon two Phantom Knights monsters from my graveyard with the same level then increase their level by one!" Ute declared, searching his graveyard for his targets. "Be revived, Phantom Knights of the Silent Boots and Phantom Knights of the Ancient Cloak!"
The two ghostly creatures materialised on his field, glowing with an ethereal light. Break Sword's former materials were now level four.
Not-Ruri scanned her field then scowled. "I end." She turned to him with an almost pained look. "It should be obvious now…"
"You're…not Ruri…" Ute said.
She smiled. For an Academia invader she looked so human, so much like Ruri…"So maybe this duel could-"
"No! I will not surrender to the likes of you!" He had no reason to hold back anymore. This girl was Academia, he couldn't hold back because she looked like his missing friend. "Draw!"
A familiar rage boiled deep in his soul. Rebellion was calling for release. Ute feared to power that came when his dragon evolved but to drive the invaders out of his home, he was willing to fall into darkness.
"With Phantom Knights of the Silent Boots and Phantom Knights of the Ancient Cloak, I build the overlay network! You'll regret the Academia ever sent you here!"
"What in the world is the Academia?"
"Don't you dare try to trick me again! You've said so yourself, you're Yuugou therefore you're part of Academia!"
"How many times-!"
"Enough talk! From the pitch-black darkness, rise up against the foolish oppression and destroy! Xyz summon…rank four! Dark Rebellion Xyz Dragon!"
From the swirling vortex of stars, his dragon emerged cloaked in lightening and Ute felt it returning. The anger, the rage that had consumed him many other times before…and the other dragon was responding?
Yes it was.
The white dragon was calling out to Rebellion, to him.
To become one.
To be whole.
To destroy.
But the duellist…wasn't part of him.
She was part of her.
She wasn't to be part of this…she couldn't…never…
"Ute!"
Someone was calling…
"Ute!"
He knew that voice…
"Ute!"
…Shun?
Ute snapped back to his senses. He was back at base, the building that had once been their duel school.
But how…?
He was in one of the makeshift cots and there were others beside Shun here with him. Allen, Sayaka, Kaito…wait, why were members of the Clovers Branch here?
"What's going on?" Ute said, slowly sitting up. He felt stiff but no pain.
"We were going to ask you the same question." Allen said. "There was an explosion and we found you just…standing there."
"You weren't responding at all." Sayaka said. "It was like you were possessed."
Shun sent him a sharp look and Ute nodded in response. The Kurosaki's were the only ones who knew of his lapses and he preferred to keep it that way.
"It was Academia." Kaito said. It was a blunt statement. He was concerned but showing it now was not the priority.
Ute nodded. "I encountered a duellist who claimed to be allied with Fusion…but she didn't use fusion. She summoned another type of monster from the xyz deck. Synchro she called it."
"Synchro…" Kaito pondered. "One of the Clovers teacher once mentioned a summoning method called 'synchro'… come to think about it, he also talked about fusion before the invasion."
"Teacher Sakaki?" Sayaka said.
"We should contact him." Shun said. "If he has more information on this new summoning…"
Allen scoffed. "You won't be able to. The coward disappeared during the initial waves. He's either carded or beyond our reach."
Sakaki…that name sounded familiar for some reason. Ute shook his head, dispelling any wondering thoughts. He needed to stay focused.
"There was another thing about the duellist…" But Ute's voice faded away, he wasn't too sure if he should tell them, tell Shun, about the lookalike. He turned to his friend. "You might not like this."
"Say it." Shun said curtly. "If it's something that could give us an upper hand, you shouldn't keep it to yourself." It was slightly hypocritical coming from him, considering Shun was the one who encourage Ute to keep his 'berserker mode' a secret.
"The duellist…she looked, no, she was identical to Ruri."
Shun's eyes widened and he staggered back. "What?"
"The Fusion Pawn, she was a carbon copy of Ruri." Ute said, remembering his encounter with the duellist. "I thought she was Ruri that was…until I duelled her."
"Are you sure it wasn't just Ruri brainwashed or something?" Allen said.
Ute shook his head. "No, the similarities were only skin deep. The things that made Ruri Ruri, the small things, weren't there."
"But there's no way that's possible…"
"It is." Sayaka interjected, her soft statement cutting off whatever else Allen was going to say. "When…" She stopped and turned away.
"Go on." Kaito coaxed. "What do you know Sayaka?"
"I should have told you all earlier but…but I was scared." Her eyes fell on Shun. It was obvious now. She knew something about Ruri's disappearance, something she had been hiding. "I thought it was impossible but if it happened to Ute too…"
She turned to Ute with a hint of fear in her eyes. "Ruri didn't just disappear. Academia did kidnap her. I was there. I would've helped but the duellist…"
A shiver ran down Ute's spine. If she saw what he thought she saw…
"The duellist looked just like Ute. A Ute who could use fusion kidnapped Ruri."
{~~~}
Her teacher's eyes widened. "Yuya?"
He scrambled to his feet too fast and would have stumbled if he hadn't grabbed his cane in time.
The boy in questioned looked just as confused as Asuka was.
"Umm…have we met before Mr.?" The boy said.
The man's face fell. "You…don't remember me?"
"He doesn't remember anything." Asuka informed him. "I found him at the docks, unconscious and severely injured. He apparently has amnesia."
"Oh…if that's the case…" Her teacher straightened his stance, or as far as his body would let him given his injury. "Is it okay if I have a moment alone with our guest?"
Asuka glanced at the boy who still looked as lost as ever. She was reluctant to leave a stranger alone with her teacher but the pleading tone in his voice…
"Of course."
She left the room and wondered down the hall, far enough not to be seen or heard but close enough to come to her teacher's aid should the boy be whom he suspected.
People didn't just appear unconscious on the docks, especially not someone who looked like they just fled from Academia. The boy had no deck or duel disk on him yet he was dressed in Osiris Red and there was no way he would have just been left there in such a state. The boy should have been carded or hauled back to island. But he wasn't and with his convenient claim of memory loss, the boy had to be a spy.
It was so obvious. The Academia knew that they wouldn't pass by someone in need of help but this…this was just plain stupid. If they wanted to effectively plant a spy, they should have made him less suspicious like have him be chased by Juvenile Officers or something not just dump him at their doorstep.
But the sheer ridiculousness of the situation…it made her doubt. The boy could have honestly fled the island, unlucky enough to lose his deck but lucky enough not to be caught when he collapsed…
And teacher's reaction…
Asuka would stay on her guard. That boy was an anomaly. Until she was absolutely certain that he wasn't going to double cross them, she would be ready to subdue him.
{~~~}
She glared at him, the famed cold glare that whipped the fierce Obelisk Force in line and had even unnerved the strictest of teachers. Rumours had it that even the Professor flinched at the Captain's glare.
Not that it bothered Joeri at all.
"You do know there are other ways of admiring my beauty." Joeri said. "A photograph maybe?"
She scowled sitting up straighter in her chair. "What did you do with him?"
"With who, Captain?" He said innocently with a flutter of eyelashes. "The first year with a stutter? The new alchemy teacher?"
"You know exactly who I mean." The Captain was definitely trying not to raise her voice. Her words were blunt yet sharp, quite the deadly weapon.
She wanted to get this meeting over with but Joeri wanted to play a little longer.
"Oh! You must mean that Obelisk-"
She stood up and slammed her hands into her desk. "Where is the Synchro boy?!"
"You meant him? Why didn't you say so sooner?" He rocked on his heels as the Captain seethed. "He's on the mainland." Joeri smiled, waiting for her to explode, that was always fun to watch.
But she didn't, instead she sat back down and returned to her professional persona as Captain of the Obelisk Force. "You let the only lead to your failed mission escape? The Professor won't be pleased."
Joeri rooted his feet. That was a low blow. "The mission is not a failure. It is simply in progress."
"But you came back with a doppelganger with your target's location unknown when previously she was in Academia-controlled territory? That sounds like a failure to me. " She leaned back into her chair and chuckled. "Then again, what else is there to expect when you entrust something of such importance to an Osiris Red?"
Joeri bit back a remark. Power was the name of this game and control was the key. "It's all according to my plan, Captain, to rid of two birds with one stone."
"What plan?"
He grinned, though she could easily gain the upper hand in this little game, she had never been able to hold it for long. "A plan that requires patience and cunning, Captain. You cannot expect peaches after only planting the seed."
The Captain sighed and rubbed her temples. "Fine, do your little 'plan'. Just next time, follow procedures. Do it again and I'll have you do the paperwork."
"Oh no!" He cried dramatically. "Whatever shall I do? The horror, the horror of paperwork!"
Her lips twitched slightly. "You are dismissed, Joeri."
Joeri dropped his dramatics and gave a low bow. This was his victory. "As you order, Captain Selena."