Disclaimer: We don't own Yu-Gi-Oh GX. Kenta belongs to Midna Azusa.


Judai's POV

Sooner than I would have liked, I found myself standing in front of my father, along with Asuka, as Yubel knelt before him and told him what I'd done this time. Of course, he didn't look too happy about it, but he never did like it when I left home unsupervised.

"You did what?" he asked, giving me a stern glare.

Beside me, Asuka looked nervous. Given the situation, I didn't blame her. However, this was my fault, so I'd probably be the only one in trouble. I shifted uncomfortably, knowing I was about to pay for my day out.

"Judai. How many times have I told you not to go to town unsupervised? And what's worse! You dragged Asuka into it this time! What if something would have happened to you? Who would have been able to protect you if—"

"I was being careful," I cut him off, wondering what the point was in teaching a crown prince to fight and then sheltering him anyway. "Besides, I can take care of myself."

"That may be true, but you still can't go taking risks like that! You're not always going to be able to protect yourself. Or did you forget about that little incident with the Light Brigade?"

Ouch. Thanks for reminding me of that, Dad.

"That was different! Besides, I know what happened, and I've learned my lesson about that."

"If you ask me, boy, you haven't learned anything at all! But we'll soon remedy that. I hereby order you to be confined in your room for the next couple of weeks! That means no playing with Sho, no video games, and especially no dueling during this time. Do I make myself clear?"

"But—"

"Enough!" my dad cut me off. "Should you choose to be difficult, you'll be confined to the dungeon instead! Is that understood? Now hand over your dueling deck! It will be confiscated for the time being so you can't use it to defy me." He held out a hand, glaring at me firmly.

I knew there was no way out of this one. If I kept arguing, I'd just make things worse for myself. When my dad was mad, he didn't play around. My shoulders slumped, and I pulled my deck out, handing it to him.

He took it and pointed toward the door, saying, "Now go. And I don't want to see you until your grounding is over, do I make myself clear?"

"So I'm eating in my room, then?"

I just wanted to be clear, but I guess my dad wasn't in the mood to clarify. "Go," he said sternly.

Yubel snickered, obviously enjoying this as much as any other time she got me in trouble. "Tough luck," she said quietly.

I cast her a glare as I headed for my room. It was her fault I was in trouble in the first place. I'd been on my way home, for crying out loud!


Asuka's POV

I watched Judai go, feeling sorry for him. The king was understandably furious. "Judai..."

King Kenta turned his attention to me next and, his tone gentler than when dealing with Judai, said, "As for you, young lady. I know my son can be a bit manipulative at times, but try not to let him drag you around like that anymore, understand? It's dangerous to be wandering around with a member of the royal family unsupervised."

I nodded—I'd known that all along, so why had I pushed for it? Just because I didn't want to talk about my stupid crush? Talk about immature. "Right. Sorry, sir. It won't happen again," I said with a bow.

"Good. You're dismissed. Try to stay out of trouble."

"Yes, sir. I'll do that," I said before leaving.

I wasn't normally in trouble. That was Judai's thing. But, this time, I'd played a hand in the trouble he'd gotten into. Why hadn't I found another way to change the subject? There had to be a better way than to encourage his bad habits!


Judai's POV

I found something new outside of my room—two guards, one on either side of it. I groaned, wondering if my dad had already suspected where I was. It should have been too soon for him to have already sent guards. I went straight to my room after he dismissed me.

"Prince Judai, you are hereby ordered to go in your room and stay there until the king says otherwise," said one of the guards. "We've been sent to make sure you follow orders."

"Yeah, yeah," I said, heading into my room. It wasn't like I'd never had guards stationed outside of my room before.

The same guard turned to shut the door but, before he did, told me, "Dinner will be delivered to you at 5:45. And your teachers will be dropping by to continue your lessons shortly. The king advises that you take this time to reflect upon what you've done and how your actions may affect others. You'd better be more careful next time, sir. Good day."

He slammed the door, and I was pretty sure I also heard him lock it from the outside. Great, my dad was mad enough to lock me in my room with guards outside and not even let me out to go to my stupid lessons. Gave new meaning to what I'd said to Asuka earlier.

I groaned. "Great. Now I really am a prisoner in my own home..."

Figuring my dad had already had all of my games confiscated and with nothing else to do, I flopped on my bed and, stupidly, spent very little time thinking about how sneaking out all the time affected others. As far as I was concerned at that time, all it did to them was make them worry, which I viewed as more their fault than mine.


Three days into my grounding, I was lying on my bed, bored to tears, when I heard a voice from my balcony.

"Bii bii!"

I sat up. I knew that voice, and I knew only one creature that made that sound. "Ruby!"

Sure enough, the carbuncle was on my balcony. He came running over, stopping at the foot of my bed, and said, "Long time, no see, Prince Judai! I bring news from Prince Johan, and it's not good."

That was a little more formal than I expected, hearing Ruby use both of our titles, but whatever. "Yeah? What is it?" I asked.

"He found a clue to the case of the stolen decks. He was snooping around this old military factory when he heard a loud roar coming from inside. See, according to his go-to guy, Amon Graham, the factory was connected with all kinds of Neospace-shattering events over the years and was located right here in Neospace kingdom! Amon believed that, with its shady history, it would be a great place to start, so Johan went in to check things out. Well, the roar he heard sounded like the roar of a dragon, so he headed in, and get this! He thinks he saw the Blue-Eyes White Dragon in there!"

Well, that was an interesting revelation...and slightly problematic since it implied that the Blue-Eyes deck was somewhere in my kingdom. Even worse, it was in a military base with a shady history. Hopefully, Johan's dad would never get word of that because, if he did, he'd declare war then and there.

"Really?" I asked.

Ruby nodded and continued, "He was hiding around a corner inside, watching, as some guy was showing off his monster in a duel or something and saw a large dragon head, mostly white in color with sapphire-blue eyes! But that's all he had the time to see before somebody nearly caught him! He's okay, but finding that dragon in a place like that!? That can't be good! Can it?"

Definitely not, especially since anyone with access to a military base should be acting on the king's orders. "No. I wonder what's going on."

"Who knows? It could be anything," Ruby answered.

"Well, keep me posted," I said. "I'll let you guys know if I come up with anything."

Ruby nodded. "Bii bii."

I heard footsteps outside then, followed shortly by the voice of one of my teachers, Daitokuji. "Oh, Judai, ready for your lessons?"

I quickly whispered to Ruby, "You should go. He might be able to see you."

Ruby nodded and vanished, which was fortunate because the guard opened the door just milliseconds after, letting my dark-haired, bespectacled teacher into the room. Daitokuji was my favorite teacher, but he was also a little unusual. I wasn't sure if he could see spirits or not—some days, he acted like he could; others, not so much. I didn't want to take a chance on him maybe seeing a signature monster that belonged to the Kalmar royal family.

Daitokuji walked into my room with a heavy textbook in hand, smiling, like usual. "Ready for your lesson?" he asked me.

Not really. "Yeah..."

"Cheer up, prince. Look on the bright side. Only one and a half weeks to go!" he teased lightly.

I just groaned, which made him laugh.

"Well, maybe next time, you'll remember to do as you're told instead of breaking the rules all the time," he said, still smiling.

I don't think I'd ever seen Daitokuji mad. He was a pretty easygoing guy.

"Yeah, yeah..." I answered, still annoyed at being confined to my room for two weeks.


Three more days later, Winged Kuriboh appeared beside me while I was bored and grounded. I'd even done my homework, that's how bored I was.

He kuried at me, asking, "You doing okay, partner? How you holding up?"

"I'm fine," I answered. "Just bored."

"Well, maybe you should stop sneaking out all the time. Then this wouldn't keep happening."

Et tu, Aibou? "Yeah, yeah..."

"So? You want the latest castle gossip, like usual?"

Well, it was better than lying there staring at the ceiling. "Sure."

"Well, Sho's been waiting anxiously for you to get un-grounded. He's gotten to the point where he's so bored that he's requested to have some rival from his karate classes be brought over here just so he can fight with him. Asuka's been hiding out in her room, seeming down, for some reason; no one's seen Yubel since the day you got grounded, and some are starting to wonder where she went; and Kabayama says Sho's dueling's gotten good, but he's too arrogant now."

Well, as usual, there was a lot to unpack there. For one, it figured Sho would swing too far the other way—go from no confidence to arrogance. For another, I wasn't surprised he was bored.

"Yubel's run off, huh? Hypocrite," I said, focusing on that part first. Of course, she could disappear without a trace for a week, but when I did it for a few hours, it was a crime.

Winged Kuriboh shrugged and kuried, "Who knows what she's up to."

"Nobody. I bet even she doesn't know."

"You don't think she's helping Johan and O'Brien look for clues, do you? She was pretty worried about that."

"I don't know. Maybe. She'll probably show up again when I'm actually allowed out of my room," I answered, rolling my eyes. It just figured that the time I'd have been able to enjoy not having Yubel around would also be when I was stuck in my room every day.

"Too true!" Winged Kuriboh agreed, eyes closed. Apparently, he thought I'd pinned her.

I closed my eyes, yawning. There was nothing more boring than being stuck in my room all day.

"Tired, partner?" Winged Kuriboh asked.

"Not really, but sleeping's about all there is to do around here."

"Oh, okay."

Alright, I'd run out of things to talk about involving Yubel. All the other news involved Sho. As much as him getting arrogant in duels now was a problem, there was something Winged Kuriboh had said before that that was more concerning.

"So...Sho wants somebody to fight with?"

That was the most senseless thing I'd ever heard.

Winged Kuriboh shrugged and answered, "Or so he says. He only has one friend to entertain himself with, so fighting's his only means of social entertainment. Or so he says."

Well, that was ridiculous. I sighed. "Sho..." I'd have to see if I couldn't help Sho make some other friends sometime. There wasn't any reason he should be dragging someone from Tiller over just so he could fight with the guy. Speaking of being worried about my friends... "...And what's this about Asuka locking herself in her room?"

"Guess she feels guilty. I don't know."

"She shouldn't. It's not her fault." I was the one who wanted to sneak out, so it wasn't like she did anything wrong. If anything, she'd done something right because she'd made sure I wasn't alone when I did that.

"But wasn't she the one who made you go out there this time? Something about covering up what Sho had said?"

Okay, yeah, she had been trying to change the subject, but still, she wasn't responsible for my actions!

"I was gonna go, anyway. Besides, if she said anything, she'd probably have been kicked out."

Confessing to having a hand in my latest escape? My dad wouldn't want her anywhere near me after he found out she'd facilitated it.

"True," Winged Kuriboh admitted.

"I'll talk to her about it...in about another week."

I figured I could get Asuka feeling better about it all if I just reminded her that I was going to sneak out anyway. Sure, she'd agreed to it, but her saying it was a bad idea wasn't really going to stop me in the first place. If I wasn't grounded, I'd have gone to talk to her right then. As it was, however, I was stuck. Man, I hated being grounded.