"It's over now Gong, my victory is certain." A sharp, teasing voice said. It sounded like it belonged to a child. When Yuya and Zuzu pulled the leaves out of the way to see into the clearing they saw that it was indeed a young boy who had spoken. He had baby blue hair tied in a short, high ponytail with a fringe and bangs hanging halfway down both sides of his face around his green eyes. He was wearing a simple blue shirt and brown shorts with brown, lace-up, flat shoes. He had a blue duel disk on his arm and was in the middle of a duel with a guy twice his size. Said guy was incredibly tall and strong with black eyes and hair, which jutted out above his face, except for one strand that hung down off the end. He was wearing a white shirt and black pants with black boots. He too had a duel disc on his arm except his was grey. Zuzu wasn't sure whether to speak to them or avoid them. She took a good look around the clearing and realised it was much larger than it first seemed. There was a lake a few metres away to the left and to the right there was a series of trailers parked. Some plain brown, some with cages and some painted in bright colours. There were a few people walking or sitting around, some even dressed up and practicing tricks. It was fairly obvious to her these people were part of a traveling circus. Yuya, however, hadn't noticed any of this, he was far too entranced by the duel between the tall guy and the boy with the blue hair. The boy had a huge vending machine on his side of the field and one of the creepiest monster's Yuya'd seen. Well, he'd never actually seen duel monsters in real life before, but he hoped they weren't all like that one. It was some kind of hybrid stuffed animal with three heads; a bear, a sheep and some kind of animal he'd never seen before. It also had a bunch of mechanisms and metal tools jammed in it connecting it together like a three-headed cyborg. He had one facedown and 2500 lifepoints. His opponent had a couple of monsters on his field that looked like old samurai warriors. He had 800 lifepoints.

"On the contrary Sora, it is you who will lose." He said, drawing a card from his deck. He glanced at it and smiled. "I tribute my two monsters to summon my Superheavy Samurai Big Benkei." A huge glow erupted on his side of the field, completely engulfing his two monsters. When it died away a new one had taken their place. This one, like the two before it, was dressed as a samurai, which made sense to Yuya now that he knew it had samurai in it's name. It's armour was mainly red but with a few gold accents. "I activate my card's effect." The tall boy continued. "This lets me summon him in defense mode, and I'm allowed to attack you using his defense points." The small hologram showing the monster's stats that had appeared earlier told Yuya the monster had 3500 defense points. Enough to destroy the blunette boy's monster but not enough to wipe him out. "Now, Superheavy Samurai Big Benkei, attack!"

"Not so fast!" The boy cried. "I activate my trap card: Frightfur Defender. Now, not only is my Frightfur Chimera saved from your attack but it gains 800 ATK." His monsters attack points went up to 3600.

"Oh no!" His opponent cried.

"Oh yes!" The boy smirked mischievously. Now that the creepy three-headed monster, apparently named Frightfur Chimera, had the most attack points it easily destroyed the other monster. "Now my Chimera's effect activates: When it destroys a monster in battle it gets summoned to my side of the field and my monster gains 300 ATK." The destroyed monster rematerialised on the boy's side of the field and his monster's attack increased from 3600 to 3900.

"You win Sora, just get it over with." His opponent sighed, though he smiled after he'd spoken. The boy, Sora, drew a card but didn't bother to look at it. There was no need, as soon as he'd ordered his two monsters to attack, the tall boy's lifepoints dropped to zero. They both deactivated their duel disks causing their monsters and generated cards to explode in a lot of gold pixels.

"Oh my god that was amazing!" Yuya cried, running from the bushes and right inbetween the two, who were now both staring at him in shock, "I've never seen a real duel before but I always wanted to and now I wish I could try it that looked so cool the way you both got so into you were so sure you would win and you went all out in your attacks that was amazing. And the effects… Oh… They were so cool it was like it was all real. I bet it feels wonderful to duel." Yuya rambled on endlessly, so caught up in his excitement he wasn't thinking about anything else.

"Yuya!" Zuzu scoulded, rushing to join him and trying to snap him out of his craze. "We're suppose to be staying out of trouble." She hissed into his ear when she'd reached his side. This seemed to finally get his attention and pull him back to the real world.

"Oh right, I'm sorry Zuzu." He appologised sincerely. Zuzu shook her head and smiled, she couldn't stay made at him, no matter how hard she tried.

"Um… Sorry, but who are you two?" The boy called Sora asked.

"Oh," Zuzu gasped, remembering the situation they were in. "My name is Zuzu and this is my friend Yuya."

Just as with everyone else the two boys thought of the prince then dismissed the idea.

"We're travelers," Zuzu continued, "we didn't mean to intrude."

"That's quite alright." The tall boy said, walking over towards them. Sora did the same so that they were all much closer and could hear each other better.

"My name is Sora." Sora introduced with a bow, "I'm an acrobat."

"Acrobat?" Said Yuya.

"Yes," The other boy said, "you see we are part of the Fusion Travelling Circus."

"Fusion Traveling Circus?" Both Yuya and Zuzu said.

"Yeah, come on we'll show you." Sora said, laughing and grabbing both their arms. He dragged them over to the trailers on the other side of the clearing. The other boy followed them. Sora stopped when he reached a trailer that was covered in posters. Most of the circus' other performers had noticed them by now but made no move to approach. "This is everyone." Sora gestured to the posters. He then pointed them all out to Zuzu and Yuya, explaining who each of the people on the posters were and what they did.

"This is me and the other acrobats," the poster he pointed to had a picture of him and a hoard of other boys and girls though from the picture it looked as though they were much older than him. All of them were dressed in blue leotards, each with their own different features and accessories. "We're called the Obelisks."

"Why?" Zuzu asked.

"Long story." He laughed.

"This one is of me."

They all turned to see the other boy with the black hair pointing at a poster. They all walked over to get a better look. It showed him holding a stack of massive metal beams with just his hands, under the headline: "Gong the Strong man."

"As you can probably guess I'm the circus strong man." He said. "You guys can just call me Gong." He smiled at them.

"It's very nice to meet you both." Zuzu said as she and Yuya shook hands with Gong and Sora.

"Who are the rest of these people?" Yuya asked, gesturing to the other posters.

"Well there are the animal acts of course." Sora said, pointing at the posters of the animals. Some of them had a man in them as well, Sora explained he was Jean Michel Roget, the animal tamer. "Then we have the clowns Bonz, Rex, Weevil, Sid and Zygor. (Yeah I was running out of characters alright) And this is Dennis our magician." He pointed to a poster with a boy that had orange hair framing his face in downward, wavy points.

Gong then pointed to a poster of a young man that had purple hair with blue highlights. He was sat on a motorcycle. "This is Shinji, he's like the daredevil in our group, he does these cool stunts for the crowd."

"That's about it except for Leo, Declan and Riley of course." Sora said. Gong nodded, agreeing with him.

"Who?" Asked Zuzu.

"Leo Akaba is the ringmaster and owner of the circus." Sora explained. "He prefers not to have his face on the posters though, he'd rather people see the actual acts."

"Declan and Riley are his son and daughter." Gong continued. "Riley's a bit shy, she barely talks to anyone except Declan, she's very attached to her brother."

"As for Declan he's very straightforward and kind of uptight but he's alright." Said Sora. "He organises venues and advertising and stuff like that."

"I also need to keep you focused and in-line." A new voice said, this one was calm and had a bit of a whisper to it.

"Ah!" Sora jumped, spinning round to look at the voice's owner who was stood directly behind him. "Declan! Don't sneak up on me like that!"

The others all snickered. Sora turned to scowl at them, moving sideways a bit as he did so, allowing Yuya and Zuzu a better view of the new person, Declan. He was wearing white pants with a matching white jacket and tie. He had a plain black shirt on underneath and white shoes on. His hair was dark grey at the base with thick streaks of lighter grey over the top. He also wore steel square glasses over his dark purple eyes.

"And who do we have here?" He asked, bending down a little to examine Zuzu and Yuya closer. As he did a shape shifted behind him. Yuya tilted his head to get a better view and saw that a young girl was clutching Declan's hand and doing her best to look invisible. She was wearing brown shorts with a darker brown poncho that had a hood which she'd pulled over her head. Her hair, from what Yuya could see poking out under the hood, was a greyish blue and her eyes were a deeper blue. They seemed to dart around in panic before they locked with Yuya's and widened in fear. She immediately averted her gaze and tried to conceal herself further behind Declan. This must be Riley, Declan's sister, Yuya realised.

"I'm Zuzu and this my friend Yuya." Zuzu said, in answer to Declan's question. "We're travelers on our way to the Kingdom of 5DS, we accidentally came across your clearing here." She gestured around.

"I see." Declan replied, pushing his glasses further up his nose. "Well no harm done." He smiled at them. "It's nice to meet you." He held out his hand and both Yuya and Zuzu took turns shaking it.

"Perhaps you could take down your hoods." He suggested. He was surprised at their reaction. Yuya immediately grew tense and Zuzu stood in front of him defensively.

"You'll have to forgive us," said Zuzu, "my friend is a bit conscious of his appearance."

"Ah don't worry." Sora said, grinning. "We're in a circus, we don't judge."

Zuzu and Yuya both hesitated, when Yuya surprised everyone, even Zuzu, by unbuckling the clasp on his cloak and letting it drop to the floor. He ruffled his wings a little and ducked his head, feeling self-conscious as always. Zuzu removed her cloak as well and stood in between Yuya and the others, placing her hand over the hilt of the dagger on her belt, a little gift from Astral in case they ran into trouble.

"Wow…" Sora whispered, eyes shining. "You have wings! That's so cool!"

Zuzu and Yuya both straighted up in surprise. This was the first time anyone had reacted this positively to his appearance.

"You're… you're not scared?" Yuya asked, still in shock.

"Of course not." Sora laughed.

"I admit I've never seen anyone quite like you before but you seem like a decent person, I don't see why we should be afraid." Declan added. Although Riley seemed to counter his statement by whimpering and hiding herself even more behind her brother. Zuzu relaxed and removed her hand from her dagger.

"Thank you." Yuya said, giving a small but incredibly warm smile to the three circus performers.

"Come on, I want to introduce you to the others!" Sora exclaimed. He grabbed Yuya and Zuzu by their wrists and dragged them away towards the other performers. Gong quickly took off after them. Riley inched out a bit further from behind her brother now that they were gone.

"You alright?" Declan asked, kneeling down so they were eye-level. Generally, he liked to remain calm and keep his feelings to himself. Stoic, that was Declan. Riley was one of the few people he allowed himself to relax and be a bit more expressive around.

"Yeah." The young girl mumbled. "He was weird."

"I admit I've never seen anyone like him but it's pretty obvious he's got a good heart, try to be nice to him okay?"

Riley nodded and Declan smiled at her. Then, without warning, he lifted his younger sister by her arms and swung her round his shoulders into a piggy-back. Riley squealed in delight causing Declan to chuckle a bit too. The two of them then headed off to see where Sora had dragged the others to.

"Oh my, simply incredible!" An enthusiastic adult voice said. Declan found the group stood by the animal trailers. The trainer, Roget, was tugging on a distressed Yuya's wings. "Remarkable I've never seen a creature like it."

"He's not a creature he's a person." Gong said firmly, forcefully removing Roget's hands from Yuya's wings.

"Thank you." Yuya whispered. Gong smiled at him and nodded.

"Hm… A person? How rude of me." Roget said, taking Yuya's hands in his own making the poor boy feel uncomfortable. "Please accept my apology."

"Um… Sure…" Said Yuya, unable to stop his voice from going up a few octaves in nervousness. He was getting a really bad vibe from this guy.

"Gong, Sora." Declan interrupted, making his presence known. "Perhaps you could escort Yuya and Zuzu to my father's trailer, I'll meet you there."

"Sure." Sora said, smiling, clearly not feeling the tension in the air at all. As so as they were out of earshot Declan glared at Roget until there eyes locked.

"I'm warning you now, if you do anything—"

"Declan, please, who do you take me for?" Roget said with fake innocence. Declan simply scowled at him.

"You've caused enough trouble over the years, I still don't know why my father keeps you around. Those two are innocent travelers simply trying to get the the Kingdom of 5DS, the last thing they deserve is whatever you're thinking." Roget opened his mouth but Declan cut him off before he could say anything. "Don't try to deny it, I recognise that look on your face."

Roget hummed in amusement and turned his back to Declan.

"Are you sure it's me you want to be having this conversation with?" He asked suggestively. Declan scrunched his eyebrows in confusion but quickly shook it off and turned to leave.

"No matter what you try to do you can't stop me." Roget said, even though Declan was gone. "That "person" is the most unique creature I've ever seen and one way or another, it'll become a part of my collection."

Meanwhile…

"Hm… Intriguing…" Don Thousand said, watching the events unfold in his mirror. The crystal's glow diminished and he was once again faced with his own reflection. "Perhaps I'll wait a bit before going to retrieve him, this looks like it could be quite entertaining." He smirked and turned to the table behind him where two criminals with eccentric hair were beginning to stir.

"What happened?" A deep, grating voice groaned.

"You were both careless fools, is what happened!" Don Thousand thundered causing both of them to sit upright. Marik and Bakura looked down at themselves finding they looked exactly as they always did, though they vaguely remembered getting blasted through a wall. They looked around to find they were back in Don Thousand's secret lab. "I've revived you because I'm going to give you a second chance at hunting them down," Don Thousand continued, "but fail me again and I'll have your heads mounted on my wall!"

The two brothers had received many threats throughout their careers as criminals but Don Thousand's was the first to actually make them a bit fearful. Of course they didn't show it in any way. Instead they simply nodded and, reluctantly, thanked Don Thousand for his generosity.

"I'll teleport you as far as the edge of the kingdom of ZEXAL, I haven't enough power to get you closer, you'll have to make your own way through the forest. Don't fail this time, remember, bring Yuya to me and kill the others." Don Thousand instructed. Marik and Bakura just nodded, not really in the mood for speaking right now. They simply stood stoically as they were teleported away. Determined not to fail this time.