Annex 017: A Question of Three
Seven city blocks later and the jewel stopped emitting its strange lights. "Okay, I am either it lost power." Uno took in his surroundings. He had left the busy commercial districts behind him and ended up in a quieter community. "Or it wants me to be.. here?" One house contrasted sharply with the others, the one that at first gleaming looked like a haunted mansion. There was a sign above the door. "The Sisters of Prophecy? What is this, like a fortune tellers place?" There was another sign next to the door that provided a bit more context. For a price, one could have their past, present or future read here. "Psychics? Really? That's what you wanted to show me?" Uno scolded his pendant, as if it wad going to give a response. "Eh. Eric said hypnosis could work. Maybe these psychic ladies can do that for me. It ought to be funny either way."
Uno opened the door, a bell above him chimed to sound his arrival. "Hello?" He called out nevertheless, since he did not see anyone in the hallway. This house smelled old. A strange incense clung to the air, drenched in vaguely familiar aromas. Uno waited for a couple of minutes. Nobody came. "I'm coming in!" If they didn't want him snooping around, they shouldn't have left the door open; he reasoned. If there were people here, they'd probably be inside a living room. Getting there was a chore. Books were littered across the floor, fancy bottles stacked up against the window and candles provided ambient lighting. "It's like these people never heard of electricity... or fire hazards." The hall felt like it was going on forever. He walked carefully to avoid knocking anything over. "I was told there were psychics about!" Someone would have to hear him eventually, he was not the most quiet of visitors.
Someone did. "Lost something?" A shrill and small voice came from Uno's left. Uno had not even noticed a pathway there. "Wait!" There was a flash of a person fleeing around the corridor, disappearing behind a door. "I need to.." He dashed through the same opening and wound up inside a large room. "Wh..whoa." There appeared a massive library. Books and folders of all sizes lined the walls and statues of mythological deities rested in the corners. The outside of this place did not look like it could contain all this on the inside. There were a few touches of modern technology in here; reading lamps and a few computers.
"Fancy seeing you here, young duelist." Another voice came from Uno's right. This one sounded more demure. "Ha! How long have you been there?" Behind a table, sat an ample woman dressed so flamboyantly that Uno questioned his own senses for not noticing her before. "I am always here." She wore a furcoat with a rim of feathers that carried each color on the rainbow. Her fingers, neck and waist were covered with jewelry and her hair was styled like a super models hair. A crown rested on her head. "Are you the fortune teller?" She could not be much older than he was himself. In either case, but it was hard to narrow down this woman's actual age under all that make-up. If she was that young, Uno had doubts about the validity of her occupation. More than one normally would. "We are the fortune tellers, yes." She responded. "We?" Uno realized they were not the only ones in here. There was another person on the second floor, he could hear someone slowly flipping through the pages of a book. Her appearance was obscured by the huge chair she was sitting in.
"You didn't read the sign?" And the third person, the tiny voice, was right behind him. "Eh?" Uno turned around, but she was already somewhere else. "O..kay." The third person sat on of the bookcases now, swinging her legs back and forth. "You came for us; the sisters of prophecy. You didn't have to shout." This one was definitely very young and less colorful. "Sisters." She wore a white coat dress and a white boater hat. Her hair was mousy blonde with two long pigtail braids that reached all the way to the floor. Everything about her was muted, except her eyes. Her irises were blood red. "That's the word. My name is Veronica. And that is my younger sister, Chloe." The woman at the table pointed her long fingernail to the second floor. "Upstairs is our older sister, Margot. She does not speak much with our visitors." Veronica said loud enough that 'Margot' could hear her. She kept reading. "You couldn't afford her anyway." Chloe said, shaking her head. "Not her? Do you provide different services?" They were talking like they were all psychics. "Just like time does, young duelist. The Past, the Present, the Future. We can see it all."
"So what would I need to 'afford' the other two; the past and present?" Uno said without consideration for the critical lack of money in his pockets. "I knew he would ask for the past. Nobody else did.." The little girl let out a sound of joy. "Well I suppose you would know.. I want to learn about my past, because it was taken from me." Seeing the past was a talent the common man already possessed. Yet Uno was one of the few who had no such ability. "You were meant so say something else..." Chloe sounded disappointed all of the sudden. "He still does not remember. I'm affraid the past is not available either, Uno." Veronica claimed. Uno was aware that she was using his name before he had uttered it. Though they could have just read that from the ID-tag on his chest. They called him a duelist too, but anyone could spot the dueldisk on his wrist. "Not even that? You know I'm beginning to think you're not what you say you are. How about you give me a little proof of your powers?"
"What was that?" Chloe asked, as she jumped down from the bookcase. "The young duelist tried to bait a free answer from us. How very surreptitious of you." It was getting hard to ignore that this kid did not talk like a kid. "No harm in trying. Guess you aren't born yesterday." She was a lot smarter than he had at first assumed at least. "We were born on all days, in a way." Chloe said almost melodically and spun around to disappear in between the bookcases. "..Never mind her. We don't like to work with empty pages. But you have plenty, you have your present. You can ask me anything you want about the now.." Veronica whipped up a machine from under her desk. "As for proof. Will this suffice?" The device was a projector, much like the ones you would find on a dueldisk. It visualized images of dueling cards; Superheavy Samurai Big Benkei, Volcanic Doomfire, Mermail Abyssmegalo, Hi Speedroid Chanbara and Odd-Eyed Pendulum Dragon. "!" Those were the cards of his friends, of himself. She was not simply making shots in the dark here. "How did you know?"
"Careful, Uno. From here on in, how you phrase your sentences will decide everything. You have three questions and you get only those three." Veronica removed the projections. At the same time Chloe re-appeared at her side. "That was not a bad question though. Everyone wanted to know how we do our magic. They never asked, but we could tell." Veronica then clapped her hands. "That is the one answer we never give. So let's begin, Uno. What do you want to know? What do you want us to tell you?"
Everything turned to silence. The only noise in the entire house came from Margot upstairs; the flipping pages were like a ticking clock. Uno had to think this over. If they were the real deal, they could give him everything he wanted. Yet he'd have to word any question perfectly. He did not trust them to give straight answers otherwise. If he asked them what his real name was, they'd likely just say he had no real name 'presently'. So what did he want to know? He had to find out about Uno, the pendulum, that woman and anyone who might know his true identity. They were key to all of this. "There is a man I am after, or a woman.. you never know with names these days." The best approach was to give them with context, so they couldn't use fake ignorance. "People from Dreamworld, Iria and Zach, know this person. His name is UNO as well. My first question is this; where on the map is this person at right now?" A question about identity could be interpreted so many ways, but locations were precise.
"40.712777 and -74.005842." The answer was a bit more exact than Uno had bargained for. "Huh? What.. Oh, coordinates." He quickly shut himself up before he was suckered into asking follow-up questions. At least Veronica was nice enough to print out a map to go with it. he'd have to check which buildings were there later. "Fine, moving on. My next question. Why did this.. ahem.. why is this pendant not glowing right now?" He had to avoid the past tense in his sentences, but there were ways to indirectly ask about it. "Because nobody else is using it right now." The second answer was both obscure and clarifying. "Someone else is using it? Is it like a transceiver then? Was someone else trying to tell me about these girls?" It was another mystery Uno he couldn't get into. "Okay, my final question. I don't know my actual name, but there should be someone who does." He had to have ties with family or friends in my past. If they werent going to talk about the past, someone else would. "So what I want to know is the full name of someone, anyone besides the people I already met, who can tell me who I used to be."
Now the last question was out there and Veronica took a decent amount of time to think of an answer. The tension was palpable. "It is a good thing you added that qualifier in the middle end, Uno. Or else we would've given ourselves as the answer." Chloe's jabbed in between the seconds. Margot was still reading. "Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon can." Veronica finally answered. "Wh-what?" That was the name. Not of a person, but of a monster. "What is that supposed to mean?" This was not enough, he wanted more. "You never said the name had to belong to a person. You spent your last question, Uno!" Chloe reprimanded him. "But I don't understand. How can a card tell me who I am? You have to help me! There must be something else you can do for me! Hypnosis, divination, tarot reading, anything!" He angrily shouted. He was not ready to leave yet, not now. "If you wanted my help, you should have done things differently." The little girl glared at him, her eyes burning with a hellish intensity. "You shouldn't have asked for what you needed, but for what you wanted."
"What I wanted?" Uno stammered. "Indeed. What do you want, Uno?" Veronica now asked him a question. Chloe was still waiting. Even their older sister had stopped making sounds. "I want.." What did he want? What kind of desires did he have? Just because he knew so little about himself, did not make him an empty person. He knew what he liked. He enjoyed the sound of laughter, the attention of others, the excitement of a duel. Was that it? He wanted friends, but that was just a consequence. The cause of that desire was something else. "I want to help people, I want them to want me." That was what he felt. Even if he knew who he was, he would be lonely by himself. "Friends. You already made a few. You could have gotten a lot more." Chloe whispered softly. "More? Yes.. more." Uno did not know why this emotion was swelling up inside him now. But he wanted to have more allies, not just friends. "Maybe you're here for a reason, Uno. This is not about fame. This is about making an impact on this strange world. It never felt right." He needed to make a connection with entire groups, with something like a guild.
"?" A tall shadow loomed over Uno. He looked up and saw the silhouette of Margot standing above him. He couldn't make out her face or features, the light was shining right behind her. "It's time for you to leave." Veronica spoke up, pointing to a door on the left wall. "Margot says that you will find us again when you are ready." The shadow moved back into the library. Chloe had disappeared as well. It was just him and the girl of the present. "She said all that?" Uno inquired, knowing very well he'd probably not get an answer. "Hee.. Your friends are missing you, young duelist. They are wondering where you are. One of them wants to tell you about her victories." Veronica just played it off.. before her face turned grim. "Also, you don't have a lot of time left." Then the lights went out in the room and she could no longer be seen. "Hey! No fair, leaving with a warning like that!" Yelling did not help, there was no response from any of them. All he could do was take the map and go to the exit. "Was that door always here? Don't tell me, everything has always been here, and always will be." He shrugged. This was enough madness for one day.
...
Once he was far away from that place, Uno felt like being near some normal company. The castle was only an hour away. Cassius and the others were already waiting for him in the courtyard. "Yay, he's back!" Alice yelled right off the bat. "Of course. Sorry I took so long. Had a lot of stuff to do. Where's miss Brandt?" Everyone was here but Heather. "She couldn't stay here, she had to go back to work. She said it was okay if we stayed here for a few nights." Emily explained. "Ah. I see. I guess I missed a lot here." Uno noticed that the girl had a new coat and badge. "It is shiny, isn't it?" The aesthetic was the one thing that Emily's sister appreciated. "Yup. Say hi to the latest member of the synchro guild. Rank 25." Emily boasted. Apparently her victory over Zach had already put her quite high in the charts, and beating Cassius only boosted her further. "Not high enough yet, but I will get there. I'm going to help Cassius and his guild win the tournament." She only needed a few more wins at this rate. "Nice, nice, Emily." Uno said. So this was the victory that the sisters had predicted. "Uhm, we should probably tell him about the other thing too." Cassius coughed. "Other thing?" Uno noticed a piece of paper in Cassius' hands.
They told him about the invitation, about the fusion guild and the possibility of Dreamworld leaking info to the other guilds. It all sounded plausible. "Speaking of Dreamworld. I think I know where the other Uno is." He claimed. "You do? Did you get more of your memories back?" Alice gasped. "A few." Going with that suggestion would probably sound more believable than a story about three fortune telling sisters. "This is just a gut feeling, but I think UNO is working with Dreamworld right now." That gut feeling was of course the set of coordinates on the map. On the way back Uno checked that place out with the GPS in the car, and found out that it led him directly to Dreamworlds main office. "That is great! What made you remember; surgery, hypnosis?" Eric wanted all the gruesome details. They were all still under the assumption that Uno had gone to see a doctor. "Something like that."
"So what are you going to do? About the invitation I mean." Cassius was slightly more concerned with what Uno would do next. "He doesn't have to accept it, does he? He can just join us." Emily saw it as a simple matter. Uno had already beaten someone in the guild, all he had to do was ask. "But wouldn't it be rude to say no? They could get mad at him." Alice pointed out. "Yeah! We gotta check if their guild is better or not!" Eric blurted out, drawing an irate look from Emily. "Eric! Aaron is standing right there." He could not have been more insulting if he tried. "Well excuse me, Em. I just don't really know what I want to do yet. Fusions and Synchros are both cool, and it's hard to choose. I mean the best option would be getting a job like Iria. Then I could put whatever I want in my deck and not fuss with the details of guilds and stuff. And I could be.. uhm.. never mind." Such a cushy job was a pipe dream anyway. "What you should first do is go back to your mother. You keep putting it off." Emily grumbled.
"It's alright Emily. I'm okay with Eric keeping his options open. The same goes for you, Uno. I would argue that the XYZ-guild does not fit with you two. But the Fusion guild, as much as I disagree with their interests, are not a bad alternative. Though you should judge for yourself." Cassius said with remarkable informality. "Is their leader a jerk like Adamant?" Was the immediate question on Emily's mind. "Ah.. That guild has so many leaders it's not even funny. They let nonduelists handle the money, while their duelists change ranks all the time. They usually get actors or actresses to act as their spokesman. I bet you'll meet whoever it is this week if you go, Uno." He had not met any of them personally, but they couldn't be as bad as Adamant. "Where would I go to meet them?" They were not just inviting him to one of their hot spots, but to their control center. Uno had no idea where that was. "On an island in the middle of North Lake. It's a Casino."
"A casino?" Alice's eyes lit up as her imagination ran wild. "Oh no. Nonono!" Emily shook her head. "We're not going there! I know you; we'd never get out!" Alice could get excited over a firefly in her room, a building full of stimuli would be overkill. "You wouldn't be going inside there. You'd be taken somewhere separately. Likely so you can discuss the same subjects that we discussed. I also suppose it would come to a trial duel." If Cassius were to guess, the fusion guild was only doing this to see Uno's Pendulum cards. "So it's trap then?" Uno had to think about this. On one hand, he had an easy option for himself right here. On the other hand, the Fusion guild could perhaps do what the Synchro guild could not; find his true name for him. He could not stop reflecting on what those sisters had told him, that he was not here to take sides. He simply did not know all he needed to know yet. "Okay then.. I'll take it, their invitation."
(To be Continued in Annex 018: Beautiful on the Outside)