Song Bird Duelists

A Tale of Love and Betrayal in The Satellite

By: June

Chapter Two: Memories of Home

I was within sight of the restaurant when I heard a little boy crying. Screaming, begging more like.

"No! Please! Don't hurt her! Don't hurt my onee chan!"

"This is what you get for sneaking into our territory little boy!"

There was the sound of a boot connecting with a small chest, and a pained cry from the chest's owner.

I froze when I heard it, memories surfacing at the speed of light. How many times I had screamed and pleaded the thugs of the Satellite to do the same. To not hurt Sing, my gentler other half. I often took what they planned to give Sing. The matted scars on my back throbbed in memory as I looked over to where I heard the screaming. A little black haired, dark skinned boy, looking about six years old, was pleading with two men -one man tall and powerfully built, the other short and with the build of a couch warrior- in an alley on the other side of the street. One of which, the short, corpulent one with a duel disk on his arm stood over an unconscious little blonde girl of the same skin color, no older than ten.

I growled, my powers spiking. The lids of metal trashcans nearby started to rattle as I prowled toward the menacing men and the quaking boy. How dare they hurt children so young? HOW DARE THEY?! My fists clenched, I didn't notice when one of my quirkiest monsters, Jynx Merchant, popped up behind me. His ghost white face with the purple triangles under his eyes leered at me as he came to life.

"Ah ah ah, Raeven, you've gone and lost your temper again," the odd little man cackled, making me jump. His bright violet bag of Jynx tokens jingled merrily as he smirked at me with that too wide grin he almost always wore. His outfit was a hodge podge of a tuxedo, a jester's outfit and a pair of old fashioned boots this time, with his green hair being in its usual disarray. On his card, he was simply hooded and wore the jynx token bag at his side, but he LOVED to change outfits. I swear he did it just to annoy me.

"Rats. Why did it have to be you this time?"

"Oooo, touchy touchy," Jynx cackled, putting what was meant to be a soothing hand on my shoulder. It wasn't really very soothing as the Duel Spirit had six fingers and his touch felt like icewater. Which creeped me out but his usefulness outweighed such quirks. Although there are points when I wonder why I even keep him in my deck.

"Get off of me," I growled, "And do something to help those two!"

"Not if you're going to be this sulky about me being pulled out of your deck…."

"Urgh! Fine! I'm sorry I said that! Now move!"

"You don't sound too sorry," Jynx grumbled, nonetheless plucking a coin from his pocket as my duel disk flicked out to allow him to attack. The coin grew larger as I quickly sidestepped to allow him room.

That was when the thugs spotted us. The thugs' eyes bugged out of their heads for a moment when they saw Jynx and me, like they couldn't believe a shorty like me would go on the attack, and then the tallest one smirked. Both tall and short men flexing their muscles and glaring, they advanced on me. Obviously under the EXTREMELY erroneous impression that I was just being cocky and would also be an easy target like the children they had been attacking earlier. I grinned fiercely as I prowled forward to meet their charge. Jynx cackled madly as he drifted along with me.

"Who do you think you are girlie?"

"We are the Sun and Moon Brothers! We are unconquerable! We took this territory fair and square," the shorty boasted, advancing with a leer as he looked far too long at my body, "You aren't the cutest girl we've met, but we can make an exception for you, I've always liked bitches with black hair-mmmph!"

My fist connected with his mouth. Or would have, if Jynx's pale fist hadn't done it first. Apparently he had used my moving fist as an excuse to attack these idiots directly, I thought as I placed the spell card that would end this mess. Overhead, the waning moon seemed to bleed as it turned to a dark crimson.

"Why are you accosting my mistress, boys? Shouldn't you be playing nice with some other girl, ANYWHERE ELSE," Jynx queried, his yellow-green eyes flipping from their normal color to crimson red.

The idiots hadn't noticed that I had played my Red Moon spell card. Obviously, it gave some of my monsters… unexpected attributes. Specifically, it made Jynx Merchant turn from practical joker to, well, something these punks wouldn't want to meet in their worst nightmare duel. Much less when I called him to the field where he could do all the damage he wanted.

"Shit! A psychic duelist!"

"No, Duel Monsters aren't supposed to talk OR do that! Don't psychic duelists have to go by the rules of the game too?"

"But she just summoned a talking monster! What the hell is she?!"

"M-monster! Run Delphos! We'll get the little punks later for trespassing!"

I gritted my teeth, ignoring the thugs backing up, fear stamped in their piggy eyes. Monster, fiend, cursed, abomination and worse. I had been called a hell of a lot of names in my life, but it still hurt every time. No matter how numb I tried to be in other people's prescence, no matter how much I tried to shut myself off from humanity, the grade A way to make me mad was to call me a monster. Grade B way being picking on little kids. My blue-black hair started to glow white around the edges as my anger spiked, and with it my power. My fists were white knuckled as I glared at the backing up punks.

Why does everyone hate me? Why do they call me an abomination?

Beside me, Jynx cackled madly, his mad crimson eyes sparkling as he wound up to toss the now massive coin. I moved over to the kids, ignoring the thugs' frightened edging away from me. The boy had moved in front of his sister's bruised body, bravely attempting to block the giant metal disk he thought was meant for them. He staggered wearily, which was when I saw the blood trickling from his mouth and muddy tear tracks on his cheeks. Rage spiked even higher, I managed to cloak it just in time to stop from scaring him further. I moved in front of the boy, impassive as he stared up at me from his kneeling position with wide, fearful black eyes. I hoped that he wasn't afraid of me. My heart hurt as I watched the tears still falling down his too thin face. The Coin Toss attack would do no harm to me, and by extension, the kids if I had anything to say about it.

"Jynx! Show these punks what happens when they pick on little kids!"

Screams and pounding footsteps resounded as Jynx threw his best attack, howling with laughter at the thugs' hasty retreat. The by now huge coin rumbled past me, seeking the retreating thugs. Two dull thunks later and I smiled grimly when the usual pain hit, blood trickling from my lower lip. A price was always paid when I used my gift. Masochist I was not, but I did love hearing the sound of revenge. I knelt, looking directly into the younger boy's eyes. He did seem unharmed except for the fact his mouth was wide open and he was staring at me with an expression of wonder. I grinned, trying to be friendly even as my aching mouth made it more like a grimace; it had been a long time since I had seen that particular expression on any child's face when they neared me. I didn't want him to be scared. Many children only knew me as the remote, strange girl who visited Martha once every month with Sing in tow (or more often if we had defeated a particularly tough opponent) and sometimes came with them to a special field trip.

"What's your name kid?"

"M-manabe, ma'am. My sister's name is Mai." He was holding her small, limp hand

My grin eased up a little. So the kid was nervous but respectful. Good.

"My name's Raeven. Would you like to go to a place where you and your sister can get some food and shelter? Your sister can also get a doctor's help."

"Wh-what do we have to pay? Those thugs took all our food… We've got nothing to pay you with…. I can't repay you now as is! You saved me and Mai-"

Inwardly grinding my teeth at those damnable punks, I managed to keep a straight face as I interrupted, "Nothing. It's all free. The person who runs this place is very kind and a friend of mine. And you don't have to thank me. Just come with me."

Manabe's black eyes widened, "F-f-free? You mean it's all free? Really? Mai and I don't have to pay?"

"Really really. Martha's house is open to everyone."

"Ms. Martha? You know her?" Manabe's eyes lit up with hope even as he started coughing. More blood spattered from his lips.

I blinked in surprise as I caught him, standing him upright when he finished coughing. Surely this kid wasn't one of Martha's. She would never let them stray this far into dangerous territory without scouring the whole of Satellite to find them, not to mention raising the roof with anger and worry. She treated every child that came into her care as her own. Hell hath no fury like a mother protecting her children, I thought wryly, Even if she's just a foster mother, Martha's fury can be terrible to behold. You hurt one of her kids and there is NO holding back. Not to mention she fostered three of the greatest duelists to ever come out of the Satellite, all three of whom would duel to the death to protect her and her kids. I mentally shook my head to get the irking memories of the Enforcers out of my mind, and focused back on Manabe.

"Have you been to Martha's before?"

Manabe looked faintly embarrassed and a little upset, "Yeah. We were taking a field trip to the park with Martha and Big Brother, and I wanted to talk to Big Brother and show him some stuff I drew for him. When I looked, I couldn't find him and then I started looking and looking, holding my drawings, but I still couldn't find him! So I wandered away from the group, but big sister Mai found me an' said I shouldn't' t have gone that far. But, ummm…." His cheeks darkened as he fidgeted nervously, his curly black hair bouncing as he stalled.

"But what?" I prompted with as much patience as I could muster, unintentionally scowling. I mentally winced when my tone came out harsher than intended. Note to self, must work on conversation skills…. Manabe must have realized my patience was growing thin, because he started to babble.

"And, and we got lost because onee chan couldn't remember the way she had come, and we couldn't s-see the group no more! So we went back to our old hideout, but those meanies had taken it over! They wanted to duel me, but I didn't have a deck, so they t-t-tore up the drawings for Big Brother and hit big sister and she fell down like she is now," Manabe babbled, misery clear in his eyes as he held up two halves of grimy paper, the drawing illegible now.

Then his eyes began to shine again with that same wonderment that they held when he saw me up close, "And then you came along! When you told that funny crazy man to attack, you looked just like Big Brothers when they duel! Only duels for big brothers are usually on a Duel Runner…. Do you have a Duel Runner?"

Inwardly smirking at Jynx (who was still chasing the thugs) being called "that funny crazy man", I sighed, "Yes, and you can ride on it in a minute. Stay with your sister and yell if you find trouble."

"Trouble finds me, not the other way around!" Manabe scowled in embarrassment.

"Alright, alright," I muttered exasperatedly, already getting irked by how fast the kid recovered from his scare, "Yell if trouble finds you or the other way around, whatever. I need to get out from between the buildings to call my Duel Runner, okay?"

"Okay."

I headed out. Rather than use our prize money to buy better habitation, my sister and I used our money to better our Duel Runners. Me being the mechanic of the family, I had invented a way to call our Duel Runners to us remotely, as well as a defense system. Anyone who wasn't me or my sister (or a recognized guest user) got a sharp zap. If they tried again, they would get increasingly harder shocks. If you were too hard headed to realize that the shocks wouldn't stop, they eventually reached killing level, but at least I had put in an alarm connected to our respective duel disks at some point so that we would know if someone got that far. Sure deterred the few thieves who tried to steal runners. When we had money left over from my visits to the parts vendor and paying the bills, however, Sing would insist we treat the kids at Martha's and Martha herself to ice cream or some other silly treat. I disdained those outings, but it made me happy to see Martha smile so I went anyway more often than not.

Out of one of my silver and black hip pouches, I pulled a slim remote. Clicking the required formula of buttons, I waited coolly, watching for my Duel Runner. Soon enough, the black and white Duel Runner made its appearance, the decorative white feathers on the front of the screen area a welcome sight. I smiled. Flyte wasn't my first Duel Runner; I had crashed Freedom Flier, an earlier model of my current Duel Runner, beyond repair in one of my most painful losses when I was still training. Flyte had never failed me yet in a Turbo Duel. I still kept the mostly repaired husk of Freedom in my favorite dueling area, the abandoned junkyard. Freedom's green and white husk had been installed with the same security system as Flyte, but there weren't viable parts within Freedom anymore, so I had no idea why anyone would steal it. I was just rather protective of the first and second Duel Runners I had built that actually worked. Normally, nobody but Sing got to ride my new Duel Runner.

Well, nobody said this was a normal situation.

The black wings that adorned the sides of Flyte's slender body curved from the front of the Duel Runner back to the gracefully curved tail feathers that gleamed like jet, just brushing the ground as they curved over my back wheel. The front of my Duel Runner looked like a bird's head, gleaming yellow lights below the white crest standing in for eyes and the white pointed frontal tip standing in for a beak. The feathers on the back of my runner served a double purpose; they allowed for one extra seat built in and straps, hidden under the feathers, allowed me to lash things on to the back to carry stuff. At least the kids were small enough to both fit on Flyte. On a good day, I could fit Sing into that seat when she nagged me for a ride. I glanced back at Manabe and called impatiently, "Hey, what are you waiting for? This is our ride."

Manabe was struggling to lift the still unconscious Mai. He started coughing again, dropping Mai. She would have hit the ground if I hadn't intervened. Hoisting the girl into my arms with a quiet grunt, I said, "Manabe? Can you hold onto your sister for me? Your seat is on the back."
When he stopped coughing, Manabe gazed wonderingly at Flyte, "I get to ride this?"

Finally losing what was left of my short fuse, I snapped, "Yes! Now get your tail on there and try not to let your sister fall off!"

Manabe quickly scrabbled on, holding one of the wings I had so painstakingly painted. I took and released a deep breath, stifling the immediate urge to yell at him. I didn't like when kids or anyone touching my Duel Runner. That was how my first one got wrecked.

Easing the shivering ten year old onto the seat next to Manabe, I helped him get his arms securely around her. Then I remembered something. Dashing back around to the front of Flyte, I grabbed a familiar smaller helmet and the normal sized spare I kept for Sing. Getting back around, I plopped the spare on Mai's head; thankfully the helmet fit her. She did have a rather large head for her slender neck. I plopped the other helmet on Manabe- it was an old one from when I was younger I had been fiddling with earlier- and was relieved when it fit. Manabe gave me a confused look.

"This is so you're safe if anything comes up. Stay there and hold onto the runner and Mai at all costs. Got it?"

He nodded vigorously as I, for extra safety, awkwardly used the straps for extra insurance on him staying in. I walked around, not even nervous about riding without my black helmet. I had always gotten a rush from such danger; however, I quickly reminded myself, I shouldn't take risks with kids on board. Kids who were already injured enough as is. I slid easily into the seat, worn from the many times I'd slid in like this, anticipating a Turbo Duel that got my blood pulsing fast and burning hot. I had used to live for moments like that. However, my first crash had cooled my thirst for adrenaline for a while. Shaking my head to clear it, I automatically slipped into ready position. With a smooth whirr, my engine started and I steered my Duel Runner towards Martha's home.

Chapter Two is up! :D I like writing Raeven. What do you think of her? What do you think of Manabe so far? How am I at describing Raeven's Duel Runner? How am I doing? Please review!

Crow will enter in the next chapter, I promise! :)

-June