II
The last time Masumi had been inside the You Show Duel School, it was under decidedly different circumstances. One of her classmates had been attacked by Yūya … or at least, by someone he'd believed to be Yūya. Then, her principal had seized the chance to attempt a takeover of the school before new evidence had forced her to abandon the bid. Since then, it had become clear that the whole fiasco had been a misunderstanding—but it had been in this moment, in cracking open this little pebble of time, that had revealed an intricate geode of overwhelming possibilities … of different dimensions, of wars and Duelists who fought them … and of Duelists whose abilities transcended mere Decks and the monsters that lived inside them …
The Fusion Duelist fought the urge to shudder. In a way, it felt good to be back here. Even though this wasn't her school, walking its corridors brought a sense of familiarity back to her—a recollection of simpler, happier times.
The warmness and camaraderie condensed in her heart as several kids ran past, laughing and chasing each other, no doubt on their way to their next class. One of them, a girl of ten or eleven, skidded to a halt, her flyaway red hair practically blazing like a torch from atop the large headband that encircled her head.
"Hi, Yuzu!" she called out. Yuzu beamed at her with a smile that made Masumi wish she had a little sister.
"Hey, Ayu!" Masumi racked her brains for a spell, but soon recognized the name. Ayukawa Ayu, she remembered, had had the bad luck of being the first Duelist to lose to Akaba Reira in the Maiami Championship that had changed the world. She wondered if her Aqua Actresses had improved enough since then to possibly take on Hotene.
"Sorry I can't hang out right now," Yuzu apologized, gesturing to Herman. "I've got some very important things to talk about with this man right here—but maybe you'll catch me later? I might even be Dueling Yūya!"
Ayu's eyes traveled up, and up—and up. Possibly she had never seen such a huge man in her life. The two boys with her—one thin with long blue hair; his companion, pudgy with mousy spikes of dirty blonde—had stopped to take in the sight of Herman as well. Both of their mouths, an amused Masumi noted, were the same perfectly rounded O.
"Whoa … " The thinner of the two, who Masumi also recognized as the Junior Division runner-up, Yamashiro Tatsuya, had craned his neck so far back that he'd plopped to the floor. "You're tall!"
"His muscles are so big," whispered his friend, Harada Futoshi, already shivering where he stood in apparent awe. "You must be super-strong!"
Herman let loose another hair-raising belly laugh. "I should hope so!" he boomed, throwing out his hands and showing off his arm span for all to see. He nearly filled the width and height of the hallway in doing so.
"I am HERMAN VON STADION! Champion STRONGMAN DUELIST in all of Europe and Americas!" He winked at them knowingly. "Festhalten, meine kleinen Krieger—und auf wir gehen!"
Masumi giggled, unable to contain herself. She had no idea what he'd just said, but it didn't really matter. In one swoop, Herman had scooped up all three kids—Ayu and Tatsuya hung from one forearm, Futoshi from the other—and held them out at full span as if he was a human jungle gym. They squealed and wriggled, laughing fit to burst at the feat of strength—and yet Herman's arms didn't even budge.
"Seht diesen," he bellowed, "KOLOSS STARKER MÄNNER!"
Yūya clapped, grinning widely. Soon Yuzu and Masumi had joined him. In the same fluid movement as before, Herman had stooped down and swept the kids off his broad arms without even dropping them an inch in midair.
Ayu was breathless with her own mirth. "Can we do that again, Mister?"
Herman flashed a gleaming, toothy grin. "Perhaps once I have finished here, mein Liebling," he said apologetically, though not without mussing up Ayu's hair with a huge palm. "It puts a smile in my heart to know Herr Yūshō's wisdom shall live on to the next generation."
He turned to Yūya and Yuzu. "Shall we begin?" he asked. "If there are any classrooms that are not being used, that will be perfect. And you"—he pointed at Masumi—"Frau, er … Masumi, I believe Dennis said your name was?"
The Fusion Duelist nodded. "Would you please inform this girl's father that I am wishing the use of his Dueling facilities for half an hour?" Herman added with a glance at Yuzu. "I shall not be long with the interview."
"Um—sure," said Masumi. "You want to come with, Dennis? I don't think there'll be much else for you to do here until the Dueling part actually starts."
Dennis shook his head. "Nah, I'm good. But I think I'll head up there and keep Herman's seat warm when he gets done." A sudden thought struck him. "You think I should call Sora over here? I know Yūya loves an audience!"
Masumi was about to object—past experience had told her that two former Academia operatives in the same room as her was pushing the envelope. Until they themselves proved otherwise, she didn't particularly care if even her principal had something to say about that.
Much to her surprise, however, Herman beat her to an answer. "There's no need for a large crowd, Dennis," he said, waving a hand in denial. "As entertaining as that would be, I would remind you that I'm here on business. Perhaps this Sora could be approached later. Besides," he smiled, "I think these kids will be audience enough."
He indicated the three youngsters he'd picked up earlier. It was impossible for Masumi to determine which of them looked more excited to see the Duel ahead.
She shrugged. "All right, all right. I'll find Yuzu's dad and fill him in." Herman bowed slightly, and allowed Yūya and Yuzu to lead him away. The latter of them waved at Masumi with a wink and a "Good luck!"
"Well." She turned to Dennis. "Think you can keep three kids busy for a while longer?"
The American was already poring through a handful of cards—not from his Deck, but from a separate pocket she guessed must hold a side Deck. His grin was nowhere near as broad as Herman's, but somehow felt even brighter.
"Three kids against the pride of LDS Broadway?" He winked. "They'll be eating out of my hand before Herman's even finished."
Masumi cocked an eyebrow. "Famous last words?"
Dennis winced and put a hand to his heart. "Madam, that upsets me. You wound me with your words."
The Fusion user felt the icy smile crystallize over her lips. "I've done worse to more dangerous Duelists than you."
Dennis, she was pleased to see, deflated a little in the face of the combined efforts of her boast and bladelike grin. Just as she had been filled in over his actions with Academia, and all he'd done since to distance himself from their intentions, so must he have been told of her actions against everyone who had marched under their banner. The last such person Masumi had faced was still in hospital, last she'd heard—comatose and under heavy guard, somewhere far away from the prying eyes of the press—with the added assurance that on the very second he was declared competent to stand trial, he would be arrested for a raft of charges not seen in Japan since the Tōkyō subway attacks.
There had been motions made since then to formally designate Academia as a terrorist organization—but those had been rendered moot only months later, after the entity Z-ARC had been defeated and erased from every corner of Yūya's mind, and Yuzu had been returned to life, with echoes of the other Duelists she embodied now present within her. Academia had been declared defunct soon after, with the possibility of their island base of operations being used as a school once more—at least, after the place had been stripped down of all unnecessary equipment and materiel. And there were still calls for swift justice against the leaders of the institution—some of whom, Masumi knew full well, had been more fortunate in evading that justice than others.
"So … yeah. Maybe think about that while you're acting for the kids," Masumi said to him. "Look. I think you're a nice guy. I think you just got too caught up to think about what you were doing. And I think you did well to walk away from Academia when you did. But"—her gaze hardened—"we still both know what their Duelists are capable of. And if I hear that one of those Duelists even looks at those kids the wrong way again"—she glanced at Ayu and her friends—"and you didn't do a thing to stop them … then I suggest you speak very carefully to me from now on."
She took a step forward, and lowered her voice. "Because I might just make sure they are your famous last words."
Dennis' curly hair seemed to wilt from atop his scalp, like a Slinky toy that had lost its spring. His shrunken pupils would have given a needle a tight squeeze. "Eh … heh. Why, uh," he stammered, "why don't we go find Shūzō?" A nervous chuckle squeaked its way out of a grin so forced, it looked as though it had been plastered on his face.
Masumi allowed her smile to warm up a few degrees. "Lead the way."
Dennis nearly tripped over his feet in his haste to put a modicum of distance between them.
Herman had found an empty classroom on the other side of the school, far from the prying eyes or ears of any pupils still roaming the halls. He now sat at the teacher's desk, the briefcase in his hands propped up by the swivel chair into which he'd somehow squeezed himself. Yūya and Yuzu, at his direction, had pulled the nearest two desks up to his own; he now lounged back in his seat with an expression of extreme confidence, while she—ever the model student—sat up with her hands folded, leaning slightly forward so as to look more attentive.
"Make yourselves comfortable," Herman said pleasantly to them both. "If you need a drink of water or the restroom, feel free to use it now before we start. There is no pressure to be feeling today."
"Thanks," Yuzu replied, "but I think we'll be fine. Well—I'll be fine," she added with a laugh. "I think Yūya just wants to get this out of the way so he can Duel me."
"What she said," Yūya said, sticking his tongue out impudently. Herman's laugh was well-timed; Yuzu had been two seconds away from using her fan on her friend for the umpteenth time.
"As you wish," said the German man-mountain, before fiddling with the latches of his briefcase and opening it behind his desk. Yuzu could not get a good look of what it contained, owing to where she sat.
"Now—for this first part of the interview," Herman said as he worked, "I believe we shall start with a simple test of word association. Have you done anything of the sort before?"
Yūya shook his head. So did Yuzu—but she hurriedly amended her answer. "I know what they're supposed to do, though. They're like psychological profiles, right? You say a word, we say the first word that pops into our heads?"
Herman nodded. "Ja. There is no right or wrong answer to the tests—but the answers themselves will create a map of your mindset—and therefore, the sort of temperament you might have as a teacher of Dueling at LDS Broadway. And the words themselves may be deliberately unrelated to the profession as well—which is also the point. One's instinctive response to an unexpected obstacle tells a great many things about what sort of person they are inside. It is why I am finding such tests to be most illuminating when interviewing any candidate for a job at our school."
He leaned back in his chair, which creaked loudly and dangerously under his weight. "Whenever you are ready," he said, "we will begin."
Yuzu glanced at Yūya. He glanced back. Both seemed to share the same expression. "We're ready," she said.
Herman nodded solemnly. He breathed in through his nose, out, fiddled with his briefcase one last time. Yuzu thought she heard the sound of electronic machinery humming to life inside. Then—
"Legion."
Yuzu's eyes nearly left her sockets, so quickly had they widened. Too much had happened for her to immediately take in at once—it was as if the single word had struck at her very core.
Her senses felt as though they had increased fivefold—all of a sudden, she was aware of everything big and small inside the classroom. Every granule of dust that danced in the air, illuminated by the sunlight that streamed through the windows, every whisper of wind that caressed her face from the air conditioning vent directly above her … the shimmering forms of the girls that hadn't been sitting next to her a second ago …
She tried to move her eyes, couldn't. But she didn't need to: even in her blurry peripheral vision, she had no trouble recognizing the green hair and white-pink jumpsuit of Rin, and the dark, flowing locks of Kurosaki Ruri—which meant that the others had to be somewhere behind her—
Roman
Yuzu blinked. Had she said that? She didn't remember her lips moving. But it sounded as though it had been her voice. She tried to think—legion, yes. The largest unit of the ancient Roman military—
"Army." Yuzu barely registered Yūya speaking. He sounded far away, as if the classroom had become her whole world, and every desk inside a different continent in a sea that went on forever. But even then, she could hear the confusion in his voice. Was he looking at Yuzu right now?
"Consume."
Herman had given them no time to think, and even less to prepare; scarcely had they given their answers to his first word when his second had boomed from his lips like the deep note of a gong—
Yuzu stiffened. A hand, unseen and unfelt save only by her own senses, had reached around her neck, the slim fingers closing against her windpipe. She tried taking a breath, found that she could—the grip, surprisingly strong, was not completely choking her—
hunger
This time, Yuzu knew it was not her voice. Nor had the word been spoken aloud; it had been whispered in her ear, and then the fingers had tensed around her throat—a head of indigo hair, bound by a familiar yellow ribbon, dipped into the corner of her eye—the large bead of a bracelet much like one she'd owned a lifetime ago dug painfully into her neck—
hunger
what are you doing
Yuzu was no longer sure of whether or not she was speaking; if the words her mind could still register were truly her own. She thought she heard Yūya say "Food," as blankly and stupidly as she herself must be sounding right now—but again, Herman's omnipresent voice rang in her ears—
"Twenty."
He had disappeared completely from her sight. The teacher's desk Herman had commandeered for himself had risen up before them like some primordial monolith atop an insurmountable cliff, the backdrop of an ever-changing stage where audience and auditorium felt like one and the same. Of Yūya there was now no sign—the tiny, lonely continent that had been his desk had drifted away—she was alone now, with Rin and Ruri, all the girls whose spirits she carried—
A memory took hold of her for a split second just then, there and gone before she could muster the energy to hold it in place. She'd been three years old, and her preschool's class play was in full swing. She'd gotten the lead role, practiced incessantly for it—only to clam up and forget her lines when the spotlight was finally on her. She'd bounced back from that inauspicious start in the years since—and for that reason, she knew nothing of the sort was happening today—
She stepped forward just then—the girl who had restrained her. Serena. Her scarlet jacket fluttered in a wind that Yuzu could not feel—blocking her view … shielding her? Or was she …
Questions.
Serena's hands had tightened into fists. What are you doing? Yuzu heard herself ask again. She earned nothing for her trouble but a hard stare that sizzled with resolve … and something else.
"Violet."
Royal.
Serena had offered the response barely a second after Herman had spoken. Yuzu was getting the distinct impression she was being crowded out—of being silenced on her own stage, where she had been the star of her own show. But that was no longer the case now; one of the girls whose spirits she housed had apparently grown tired of her new lease in life—but why now?
Why her?
Herman's questions were becoming more rapid-fire in their delivery. Perhaps he had taken her more sudden—more confident—replies as an indication he should speed up; he allowed only a matter of seconds for any forthcoming answers, before moving on in the time it took to draw breath. But Yuzu, faced with the back of a defiant Serena, and a Rin and Ruri who seemed unable—or unwilling—to stop her, found the breaths she took icy and rattling, as if even these were costing her more effort than she'd ever expended in her life—
"Adapt." Change.
"Twelve." Clock.
"Biding." Time.
She could not feel her body, much less move a muscle. Her mouth felt like it had been stuffed with a wad of cotton. Every inch of skin below her neck was numb with the same tendrils of cold that caressed at her lips and crept down her mouth, spreading into her lungs and piercing through her bones—she could feel them vibrate in her body, from her femurs to her phalanges, united in a song only she could hear—the words still kept on coming—
—and yet Serena still kept on speaking—
wait
"Evolve." Advanced.
"Six." Feet.
"Crucible." Forge.
stop
As if the single word had been a command, Rin and Ruri moved as one. Neither spoke a single word—neither even blinked. Unbound by physical limits like mass and muscle—having been reduced to a mere spiritual form within Yuzu's own mind—the speed at which they lunged for Serena, hands balled into fists, was almost instantaneous.
Almost.
"Survive."
There was no "almost" with Serena. She'd intercepted the fists of her doppelgängers before Yuzu knew what had happened, so quickly had she moved—and caught them effortlessly in her own hands. Serena hadn't even turned around—nor did she need to. Yuzu could feel something when she looked at her counterpart now—something foul and polluted, something that should not be.
Victory.
Serena's response—delivered with an animalistic pleasure Yuzu had never once heard from her in all the time she'd known of her existence—renewed the tendrils of pure cold that assailed her inside and out a hundredfold. They tightened within her like strings, binding her body, mind, and soul—truly helpless, truly defenseless—
She heard no sound—no snapping of bone, no screams of pain—when Serena twisted the outstretched hands of Rin and Ruri at the wrists, forcing them to bend at odd angles, before finally tossing them away from her as if swatting so many bothersome insects—
"One."
An unnatural silence had descended. A cold, gray mist was closing in on Yuzu; Ruri and Rin were nowhere to be seen. Even Akaba Ray—if she had ever summoned the courage to show herself in the first place—had long since disappeared. Only Serena, the shadow of the monolithic wall behind her, and the vague sense of solid ground under Yuzu's feet could still be made out against the sinister fog.
And now Serena was turning towards her, revealing her face to Yuzu for the first time. The vivid green of her eyes gleamed like the scales of a snake; her lips peeled back in a sneering smile, just barely exposing the tips of her perfect white teeth—she was drawing herself to her full height—the snake was ready to strike, to sink its venomous fangs into her skin—
Left.
She never seemed to move. Yuzu was only faintly aware of an open palm smashing into her breast—and then straight through her cold flesh. The force was astonishing; Yuzu was catapulted backwards, flying far too long and soaring far too high—the mist was closing in on her now, obscuring everything, even her own body—
—my body—
That was all Yuzu was able to think before blackness overtook her. The last sight her eyes beheld was of her own shrinking figure—her pink hair, her dark red skirt—and of Serena slowly stepping towards it, hands outstretched—
Herman nearly jumped out of his chair as Yuzu pitched forward with a deep gasp.
"Guter Gott im Himmel!" he exclaimed, hand over his heart. "Do not be scaring an old man like that, Fräulein!"
She didn't answer. She was still breathing as if she'd just run miles—and her forehead, Herman now saw, was slick with sweat. Immediately, he adopted a much different tone to his words, one far softer and less bellicose than was his usual.
"Are you … hearing me?" he said tentatively. "Are you feeling well?"
Yuzu nodded vigorously—perhaps a little too much so. "Y-yes, sir," she stammered. Her hands were shaking, and she was staring at them as though seeing them for the first time. "W-why? Is that the end of the test? D-did something happen?"
Herman nodded. "I think that will do for the first part, ja," he said, looking uncharacteristically abashed. "I am to blame. I … underestimated how much pressure that the both of you might have been feeling from this interview."
"The both of us?" Yuzu blinked owlishly. Then it hit her—and she rounded on Yūya almost at the same moment.
The boy was not breathing as heavily as she was, nor was he sweating or shaking nearly as profusely. But his face was ashen, and his eyes stared straight ahead at the whiteboard—glassy, unblinking, and unmoving—in an uncannily accurate imitation of what Yuzu guessed was the infamous thousand-yard stare.
"No, no, no … " She bit her lip, waved a hand in front of his face, then clicked her fingers—once, twice. Then, on the third click, Yūya finally flinched; his whole body twitched for a split-second as though he was having a seizure.
"I'm okay!" he said far too quickly. He glanced apologetically at Herman. "I'm—I'm okay, sir. I-I don't know what came over me."
"The fault is mine, Yūya," said Herman, waving his hand dismissively. "And there is no need for either of you to 'sir' me today. Herman will be doing just fine for now."
He stood up from the teacher's desk, ignoring the groan of relief from his chair. "Are you feeling well enough to continue?" he asked. "There is still a Duel to be fighting today. If you are not feeling up to the task, I am willing to postpone it for another time." He frowned. "Perhaps some refreshment—some time to clear your heads?"
Yūya swallowed. "Um … no, s—Herman," he said hurriedly. "I think I'll be fine."
Herman turned his gaze on Yuzu. She nodded eventually. "Yeah. We'll be a lot calmer once we've had our Duel. We're a little more used to proving ourselves that way instead of with … well"—she shrugged—"word games."
It was plain to see that Herman was not entirely convinced. He stared at them for a long time—but eventually, he gave in with a sigh. "As you wish," he said slowly. "If you would show me to your Dueling arena, then?"
Yūya's and Yuzu's faces both lit up with equally intense smiles. "Right this way," they said in unison, filing out of the classroom.
Neither of them saw Herman staring at where they'd been in the doorway, his eyes narrowed in a scrutinizing look. The deep blue gaze flicked to his briefcase, still slightly opened, for a few more seconds. Finally, he sighed and shook his head, making the ends of his mustache flutter, and closed the clasps with a click.
Then, Herman squeezed himself through the doorway to rejoin Yūya and Yuzu. His long stride meant he didn't have long to catch up; within seconds he was almost in lockstep with them, taking two steps for every three of theirs.
Five minutes later
Masumi was impressed despite herself. After collecting Shūzō from his office, explaining the situation on the way, and finally reaching the school Dueling arenas with Ayu and her friends in tow, Dennis had busied himself with doing what he claimed to do best: entertainment. He'd tossed a few of his cards into the air, and then—through some trickery of the Solid Vision that made Duel Monsters possible—one press of a button on his Duel Disk had made a Bound Wand, a Wonder Wand, and a One-Shot Wand appear out of thin air where those cards had been an instant ago, and he'd started juggling all three without even pausing for breath to oohs and ahhs from the three kids.
He hardly resembled the same Dennis she'd threatened with bodily harm mere minutes ago, she thought.
Dennis tossed the wands high, clapped his hands—Masumi's eyes, keen as any jeweler-in-training, only just noticed the fourth card pressed between them—and a Magical Silk Hat popped into being with a poof of smoke an instant later. Dennis deftly caught all three wands in the hat to applause from the kids, tipped it upside down—and the three cards he'd used to make the wands appear now fluttered into his free hand.
Magic it was not—the holograms of Solid Vision had the luxury of not having to obey silly things like physics—but it was still an inventive use of the medium. Masumi, who had seen other kids in Maiami City make use of Solid Vision in equally creative ways, both in and out of a Duel, could appreciate that much about it. She clapped along with the kids, feeling a soft little grin work its way across her face as she continued to think of simpler times.
Dennis took an elegant bow. "Thank you, thank you! Now for my next little trick, I'd like a little audience participation, if you don't mind." He chuckled as the three kids immediately put up their hands. "Oh, I'm sure you'd like that, but I need someone a little more my size for this one."
They lowered their hands, disappointed—but not for long. Ayu quickly whispered something in Futoshi's ear, and he to Tatsuya. Masumi rolled her eyes—she was quick to figure out where this line of conversation was going from how quickly the kids' gazes had turned on her.
Sure enough: "What do you say, Masumi?" She'd seen polished diamonds that didn't sparkle quite like the roguish smile that had lit up Dennis' face. "Would you like to be my lovely assistant for a spell?"
Masumi covered her mouth in mock shock, as if pretending to conceal a blush. "Keep your rabbit in your hat now, Copperfield," she said, hands on hips and twisting her grin into something equally cheeky. "I'm a taken woman."
Shūzō, sitting behind the kids, spluttered into hoots of helpless laughter at this. Dennis had gone the same shade of crimson as Ayu's hair. It seemed he had no idea how to respond to the backtalk, for which Masumi was grateful—saying that had felt so unlike her that she had no idea how to follow it up if the banter had kept on going.
Fortunately, he and Masumi were spared further embarrassment when the door to the arena opened. Yūya and Yuzu stepped inside, followed closely by Herman von Stadion, who squeezed himself through the frame with difficulty.
"Curses—upstaged again!" Dennis swiped at thin air with a fist. "Well, that's the end of the magic show, kids—but the good news is we're about to see something a whole lot more spectacular—"
He broke off. "Yūya—are you all right?"
Masumi had just noticed it herself—Yūya looked unnaturally off-color for it being such a warm day outside. Yuzu, if anything, almost looked in worse sorts than he did; the girl was taking every step as though she was walking on sugar glass. Even Herman didn't seem his usual jovial self. The huge man, even as he introduced himself to Shūzō, was stealing looks at both kids like he was worried one of them would keel over in a faint.
Yūya managed a wan smile, and waved halfheartedly at Ayu and the kids. "We're fine, Dennis," he said. "We're … we're just a little bit stressed. I should've expected someone who taught at an LDS branch wouldn't give us an easy interview."
He was looking at Dennis in a particularly meaningful way. More than that Masumi could not determine from simple observation. Perhaps Dennis knew more about Herman's interviewing processes than he was letting on, and had been wrestling with saying as much to Yūya sooner.
Whatever the reason, he seemed to understand—"but you're still fine to Duel?" Dennis still wondered. "I spent all this time hyping these kids up to see you in action, Yūya! If you're not a hundred percent—"
"We are," said Yuzu. "And trust me—these kids are going to be in for the show of their lives."
Now Masumi was frowning. Yuzu had given Dennis almost exactly the same look of intent as Yūya had done just seconds ago. Starting to feel as though she was missing something, the Fusion user made to approach Dennis.
Herman, however, must have just finished his pleasantries with Shūzō, as the latter quickly scurried away, and Herman himself stood to his full height. "Are we both ready?" The acoustics of the arena magnified his already stentorian voice fivefold.
Yūya had already secured his dark red Duel Disk to his wrist. A glowing chevron, yellow as the high sun, extended from the device with one swish of his arm. The noise seemed to revitalize Yuzu, as she wasted no time in mirroring her friend's movements. Moments later, a blade as pink as the Duel Disk on her own arm shimmered into being.
"Ausgezeichnet." Herman flashed a thumbs-up at somewhere Masumi couldn't see. Presumably it was the control room, where Shūzō must have disappeared, because a second later, a loud rumbling had started under her feet—the characteristic noise of gigantic Real Solid Vision generators coming to life.
"Duelists, take your positions!" Even Herman soon had to raise his voice over the din. Yūya and Yuzu both heard him, however, and they responded with unexpected vigor: both Duelists sprinted to roughly ten meters' distance between each other. Yuzu, perhaps wishing to display the grace and fluidity of the sort of circus performer Herman might be looking for, had even thrown in a few acrobatic flips as well, to cheers from the kids—Ayu in particular.
One second after that, the walls and floor vanished, every surface of the arena overwritten by layers upon layers of hard light. "Action Field: Athletic Circus selected," intoned a computerized voice, and Masumi felt a sudden thrill of excitement. It appeared as though today would truly be a blast from the past.
For the ground beneath both combatants' feet had been replaced with a pair of platforms, soaring high into the air, with nothing but empty space between them—or so it appeared. A full three-ring circus had been laid out below, with every kind of acrobatic apparatus imaginable—trampolines, trapezes, tightropes and nets, and more besides, all as brightly and vividly patterned as the stages they'd been built on. Enormous spheres of many colors—the smallest of them not much smaller than Yūya; the biggest able to swallow an average car whole—floated around the duo, and the bleachers, completely empty but for Masumi, Dennis, Herman, and the kids, reached out into infinity until they disappeared into blackness.
Masumi saw all this, and thought back to her first visit to this school. She'd learned back then that this had been Yūya's favorite Action Field. Even after seeing it in play once more, she knew it wasn't hard to see why. The whole place looked tailor-made for someone like him. Perhaps his father, Sakaki Yūshō, had even had a hand in designing it.
But Yūya's grin told the Fusion Duelist all—he knew he had home-field advantage, and he was intent on using it.
"Duelists locked in battle!" he bellowed. "Kicking the earth and dancing in the air alongside their monsters!"
"They storm through this field!" cheered Yuzu. "Behold! This is the newest and greatest evolution of Dueling!"
The kids were already on their feet. Dennis pumped his fist. Even Herman had stopped fiddling with his briefcase again as soon as he'd heard the traditional Dueling chant. Masumi couldn't help herself—swept up in the hype, she sprang to her feet and raised her fist with the rest of them.
"ACTION—DUEL!"
The ace of You Show was already in his element. Five cards had appeared in Yūya's hand before the Life Point gauges had even set themselves to 4000. Any modicum of ill health or fatigue he'd once possessed had instantly become a thing of the past.
His ruby eyes scanned the cards he held, and immediately he'd made a decision. "I'll start"—he plucked a pair of cards from his hand—"by using my Scale 1 Dragonpulse Magician, and my Scale 8 Dragonpit Magician, to Set the Pendulum Scale!"
Tatsuya gasped. "He's Pendulum Summoning already?"
Futoshi was already squirming in his seat with anticipation. Ayu's mouth was open, and her eyes were starry. "I've never seen him use those monsters to do it before!"
Neither had Masumi; the two robed figures now rising into the air either side of Yūya—one young and full of life, with a double-ended blade in his hands that clashed magnificently with his white robes; the other, dark-robed and in the full of his prime, clutching a carved staff with a ridged halo at one end—were unlike any monsters she had seen Yūya use before. In fact, as far as she could tell, they were Normal Pendulum Monsters—only one other Duelist she knew had ever made use of them before.
"Using these cards," Yūya grinned at Yuzu, "I can Summon as many monsters with Levels 2 through 7 as I wish!" His smile grew wider. "And I have just the monsters in mind. Watch!" He threw his hands into the air:
"Swing, my soul's pendulum!" he cried. "Draw an arc of light in the sky! Pendulum Summon!"
"Come out, my monster servants! Entermate Trump Girl … and Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon!"
Dennis' and Masumi's mouths fell open in tandem. It was hard to tell which of them was more nonplussed. Ayu and her friends were on their feet, pumping their fists and cheering as if Yūya had already won. For all Masumi knew, he might have.
The two monsters Yūya had Summoned could not be any more different: Trump Girl was little more than a chibi-style witch with pencil-thin limbs and bangs that covered her eyes completely (Level 2: ATK 200/DEF 200). Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon, on the other hand, had been Summoned so often that Masumi had memorized every inch of it by now (Level 7: ATK 2500/DEF 2000). She could close her eyes and imagine the rustle of its crimson scales against the ridges of bone that stuck out from its back like wings—feel the bellowing roar against her skin, and the thud of its wide, plodding claws against the earth, like an ancient dinosaur returned to life … and ready to charge.
He's brought out his ace monster on the first turn of the Duel? the Fusion Duelist wondered. I know Yūya's always keen to show off, but this is almost silly! Yuzu was going to have a hard time getting past that—or whatever Yūya planned to do with it. The sheer number of monsters he'd been able to make with his Pendulum Dragon had been only the first of the bits of legend that had surrounded You Show's greatest student.
"Now, I activate the effect of Entermate Trump Girl!" Yūya grinned. "Once per turn, I can Fusion Summon a Fusion Monster from my Extra Deck, using her and any other monsters on my field that I need as Fusion Materials! So I'll fuse Trump Girl with my Pendulum Dragon! Put your hands together for my latest and greatest attraction!"
Trump Girl waved her wand through the air until it came to rest on Yūya's iconic dragon. There was a shower of sparkles, and then a puff of violet smoke that hid both monsters from view. But just as quickly, the thick mist began to swirl, forming the dual-colored vortex so familiar to Masumi:
"Dragon of dual-colored eyes! Through the magic of one small soul, become the wind that blows at my back, and carries mankind to the future!"
"Fusion Summon!" Yūya chanted. "Appear now, my Odd-Eyes Vortex Dragon!"
Vortex Dragon?! This was another monster that Masumi had not seen before. She leaned forward, interested, watching the spiky silhouette of Yūya's monster transforming in the clouds of swirling smoke. The bone ridges along its back were splitting along their lengths, dividing in two—even the scarlet armor plates lining its neck looked like they were peeling down the middle—
Then, with a keening roar, Vortex Dragon dispelled the mist and revealed itself for the first time. Indigo sinew glistened and rippled beneath the sleek, emerald-green armor, lined with spiraling edges of silver and gleaming spikes of gold. Four wings unfurled like unsheathed blades as the dragon spread itself out in an attack stance, and within seconds, each one snapped with lightning that raced down every last one of the dragon's golden spines (Level 7: ATK 2500/DEF 3000).
Masumi had only a second to process the point gauge before her eyes caught a sudden movement from Yūya. The You Show ace had clapped his hands to his temples, apparently in discomfort. Perhaps it was a trick of the lightning that wreathed his newest Fusion Monster, but she thought his eyes had changed color very briefly—that for the split second the lightning threw his face into relief, the twin rubies had turned the dark purple of an amethyst.
She looked round at Dennis, but had only to take in his cheering face to know he had not seen the sight she had. The same held true for Ayu, Futoshi, and Tatsuya; they only had eyes for Yūya's monster—and not Yūya himself.
But it didn't matter—as quickly as he'd been affected, Yūya appeared to be himself once again. His cheeks were flushed, but he was grinning more splendidly than ever in his exhilaration—no, Masumi thought, not that.
His breathing was too regular; his composure much too relaxed—and were those tears in his eyes? Yes; she was sure of it now—this wasn't adrenaline talking, not the rush of staring adversity in the face. What she'd just seen reminded her more of Hotene after dismounting from the four-dimensional maze of trampolines that formed her favorite Action Field: it was pure dopamine—a state of absolute euphoria.
For some reason, Summoning Odd-Eyes Vortex Dragon had turned Sakaki Yūya into the happiest boy on the planet.
The ace of You Show let the feeling of bliss hang on his face for a very long moment, before he came back down to earth with a loud bump. He stared at the last card in his hand as if he'd just now noticed it was there, and Masumi saw his eyes light up with a spark all too familiar to her: the beginnings of another strategy.
She was proven right moments later. "Next, I Normal Summon Entermate Trump Witch in Attack Position!" Yūya shouted, and a little girl in blonde pigtails and a patchwork witch's costume leapt onto the field with a front handspring (Level 1: ATK 100/DEF 100). "And then, I'll use her effect to Release her"—Trump Witch brandished a crude, skull-and-crossbones staff, twirling it round and round until both her and her weapon had vanished from view—"and add a very special card from my Deck to my hand!
"And with that"—he ejected the single card from his Deck, and slipped it into his waiting fingers—"I end my turn."
Yuzu smirked. "You always did like putting on a one-man show, Yūya," she said as she drew a card to begin her turn. She quirked an eyebrow, apparently not finding the new addition to her liking, but the smile didn't disappear. "But the best performances aren't made by a single person—they're made by a group. Whole troupes and orchestras of people who join their efforts together to make one play—one song—that everyone remembers for the rest of their lives! And because you Summoned your Vortex Dragon in Attack Position, you just made it that much easier for me to take down—and to win this Duel!"
Then, with a suddenness that nearly stopped Masumi's heart, Yuzu leapt off the platform on which she'd been standing, plummeting down what must have been a fifty-foot drop like a lead weight—
—only to gracefully hit the tan, taut canvas of the trampoline underneath feet-first—then propelling herself high into the air, far above even her own platform. Masumi saw something sparkling in her fingers, and she wondered if she'd noticed it down below, since the start of the Duel—
"First—the Action Card: Extra Onslaught!" cried Yuzu, slapping the card onto her blade even in the midst of her soaring backflip. "For every monster I Special Summon from the Extra Deck this turn, I can draw a card, and take 500 damage during the End Phase for—
But Yūya was already moving. "Odd-Eyes Vortex Dragon's effect!" he shouted. "Once every turn, if another card effect is activated while it's on the field, I can shuffle a face-up Pendulum Monster from my Extra Deck back into my Deck—and then negate and destroy that card! I shuffle my Entermate Trump Witch!"
The blue, spherical gem embedded in his dragon's chest began to glow. Vortex Dragon's four wings let fly with a burst of lightning—and Yuzu was blasted backward, her precious Action Card reduced to naught but a few scattered photons. But with an athleticism that would have shamed any acrobat, Yuzu had gone with the movement, twisted in midair—and grabbed the pole of her platform as though she was performing on the uneven bars. Round and round she flipped, slower and more controlled with every revolution, until she came to a stop directly above the platform she'd jumped from just a minute ago. One twist later, and she'd landed in a three-point stance as though she'd never jumped down at all.
"Whoa!" Dennis was running his fingers through his frizzy hair in awe. "What a recovery!"
Ayu nodded enthusiastically in agreement. "I wanna learn how to do that!"
Tatsuya was just as wide-eyed. "I'd like to learn where she learned how to do that … "
So did Masumi. Futoshi's song and dance about his skin shivering all over the place hardly registered; she was too intent on watching Yuzu. Because Tatsuya, whether he knew it or not, was onto something—not once had Masumi ever seen that sort of litheness or vigor in Yuzu in all the times they'd Dueled together, or watched each other Duel. The Fusion user wondered if it could be a side effect of all those other minds that called her brain home—if perhaps on top of more mental attributes like awareness and intelligence, they could pool their physical strength and speed as well. Serena had been a soldier, Yuzu herself had said—and Rin could ride a motorcycle at triple-digit speeds and Duel at the same time, an act that still boggled Masumi's mind even after seeing footage of such Duels for herself. And that wasn't even getting into whatever Ruri and Ray had brought to the table …
"What's the matter, Yūya?" Yuzu taunted him, giggling. "You're not so scared to fight me that you can hardly wait to finish this Duel, are you? Or did Herman stress you out more than you're letting on? Either way, you're slipping up—you didn't have to use your Vortex Dragon on one little Action Card. Because it might work during anyone's turn—but still only once a turn. So you don't have anything left to protect yourself against anything I do next!" She plucked a card from her hand. "Like my Spell Card: Ostinato!"
The air began to shimmer with a multicolored haze. Masumi heard a faint ringing in her ears, and was about to wonder if Vortex Dragon had roared loudly enough to damage her hearing. But the more she listened, the more she was convinced that ringing was actually singing—and the louder she thought it was becoming—
"If I activate this card when I control no monsters," Yuzu was saying over the river of music, "I can Fusion Summon 1 Melodious Fusion Monster from my Extra Deck, using 2 monsters from my hand or Deck as Fusion Material! So from my Deck, I'll fuse my Aria the Melodious Diva with my Elegy the Melodious Diva!"
Two maidens, each with one harp-shaped wing on their shoulder blades, shimmered either side of Yuzu, their lithe, exotic bodies translucent amidst the mist that wreathed them. Closer and closer they drew to each other—to Yuzu's left, a graceful ballerina with purple hair shorn at the neck; to her right, a green-haired, sad-faced waif who moved with all the deliberation of a ballroom dancer—they were merging into one—
"Echoing melodious voice! Somber lament of the fallen! With guidance of the baton, gather your power!"
"Fusion Summon!" Yuzu sang. "Now come here to the stage—Meisterin Schubert the Melodious Maestra!"
The misty air rippled, distorting the scenery—and just as quickly, a swell of music erupted out of thin air, a chorus of strings and voices that tugged at Masumi's heart and caressed her skin. She felt short of breath; a quick look around her showed Dennis and the kids similarly transfixed by the rush of sound.
Then—as if the very music had given birth to it—Meisterin Schubert burst from the shimmering air, her flyaway auburn hair billowing five whole feet in every direction it could from the golden mask that concealed the top half of her blue face. Slowly, she descended to Yuzu's height and hovered there—seemingly buoyed in place by the elaborate costume of copper, red, and black she wore—and brandished a sharpened baton in Yūya's direction with an elegant flourish (Level 6: ATK 2400/DEF 2000).
That was when it happened—Masumi saw Yuzu clutch a hand to her brow, as if she'd bumped it on a low-hanging strut in passing. She'd closed her eyes out of reflex—but a second later, when she'd opened them, there it was: a flash of bright lavender, a spark that danced across her sapphire-blue irises, here and gone in the space of a breath.
In that space, however, Masumi had seen everything; now she was no longer convinced that what had happened to Yūya had been a trick of the light. Something Yaiba had said once trickled into her memory: once is happenstance … twice is coincidence … She frowned. Whatever it was had still happened too fast. She needed to see more.
But the spark soon faded, and once more, Yuzu's eyes were as blue as they'd been from birth. Immediately, her grin softened into a look of utter contentment—as if every cell in her body was being worked over by the expert hands of a masseuse. Masumi wondered if she herself ever looked like that with Yaiba, in the private moments they shared.
"Now I know what you're thinking, Yūya," she grinned. "'Yuzu's monster has 100 less ATK than my Vortex Dragon! I'm safe and in the clear!'" She held up two fingers—and the trio of cards sandwiched between them—and winked. "Yeah—no. Remember what I said about the best performances coming from many people, instead of just the one? Well, if I control a Melodious monster, I can Special Summon Sonata the Melodious Diva from my hand because of its effect—and that's exactly what I'm going to do! Just not once—or even twice!"
Masumi's mouth fell open. Huh?!
"That's right!" crowed Yuzu. "I'm going to Special Summon all three Sonatas in my Deck to my field!" One—two—three cards were slid across her blade an instant later. Then, one—two—three blue-clad maidens with the same green hair, and the same single wing protruding from their left shoulder, shimmered around Meisterin Schubert in a triangle, their lips brimming with the same hypnotic song (Level 3: ATK 1200/DEF 1000).
What are the odds of that?! Masumi thought. All three copies of one card in her hand—and monsters that could Special Summon themselves to boot? And that flash of violet she'd seen in Yuzu's eyes … Her brain was beginning to go into overdrive. What was she seeing here? What wasn't she seeing?
And what more was left to see in a Duel that had only just started getting good?
"When Sonata's Special Summoned, her second effect comes into play!" Now it seemed to be Yuzu who was in her element. "While it's on the field, every Melodious monster I control gains 500 ATK and DEF!"
Sonata's eyes flashed with a sudden burst of blue-green; her sisters mimicked her almost instantly. The song they sang tripled in its intensity, and before a thunderstruck Masumi had finished doing the mental math in her head, their point gauges had skyrocketed to 2700/2500—with Meisterin Schuberta standing tall among them at 3900/3500.
"Yūya-onīchan!" All three kids had leapt to their feet, hands to mouths as the truth sank in. Masumi bit her tongue.
Yuzu's eyes were sparking with the knowledge of imminent victory. "Battle Phase! Meisterin Schuberta, attack Vortex Dragon! And just to make sure," she added, sliding a card into her Graveyard slot, "I'll activate my Score the Melodious Diva that I was saving in my hand! By sending it to my Graveyard during damage calculation, any opponent's battling monster has their ATK and DEF become zero!"
Something rushed out from behind her at that moment: a teal-haired girl of Yuzu's size and age, resplendent in high-collared robes of lavender and white. It passed, ghostlike, through Vortex Dragon with a mournful wail; one second later, every arc of lightning that had been coursing over the dragon's armor disappeared with a final sizzle.
One second after that, Meisterin Schubert was upon the powerless beast, her bladed baton flicking this way and that over its armored body. The sleek plates that protected the dragon might as well have been papier-mâché for all the good they did; every strike struck home, and in moments the stage beneath them was littered with bits of dissected metal. One final slash from the wand finished it all; Vortex Dragon, drawn and quartered, was scattered into a thousand pieces to the furthest reaches of the Action Field.
Yūya took the full force of the shockwave that followed; he had no time to afford himself a better footing. Before anyone could cry out in horror, he'd been launched off his own platform, his Life Points blown away from their full 4000 to a measly 100—and unlike Yuzu, he didn't have any trampoline under him to break his fall.
But even as Masumi watched, spots of blood on her bitten lip, Yūya wasn't falling straight down, either. In fact, he'd only had to twist his frame a little bit to ensure that one of the enormous balls that floated around the Field was the only thing between him and the ground underneath—
It was rubbery, and did enough to cushion his fall. But Masumi heard the loud grunt from the impact. Something like that must have knocked all the wind out of Yūya; if Masumi had been in his place, her spine would be howling in pain from the bruises an impact like that would have caused. Even then, they were still the least of his worries; he'd survived one attack—but there was absolutely nothing he could do against three more.
Yuzu knew it, too. "Let's end this Duel on a high note, girls!" she smirked at her Sonata triplets. "Attack Sakaki Yūya directly!"
Their single wings flared, and the Divas went to work with a will. Sound waves bloomed from their lips in perfect three-part harmony, racing for Yūya—
But the boy had summoned a hidden burst of strength from God only knew where; he somersaulted backwards off the ball he'd been laying on, and the trio of attacks blew it apart not one second later. A smaller sphere was under him to catch his weight, but only just—Yūya, perhaps aware of this, leapt for solid ground right as more sonic blasts from the Divas obliterated that, too.
He was under his own platform now, racing along the edge of the stage, rose-red eyes scanning every surface he could. But Yuzu had cottoned on to his evasive tactics, now; with one stab of her finger she'd directed one of her Sonatas to reduce the stage right in front of Yūya to splintered wood and shredded cloth. Another gesture collapsed a balance beam behind him with a single long mezzo-soprano, trapping him—
Masumi squinted. Something had sparkled near Yūya's left hand, blown into the air from the multiple explosions. Yūya had seen it too—he twisted in the air as the third Sonata was inhaling, ready to unleash the coup de grace—
"Action Magic: Great Escape!" he managed to gasp out. "If I play this card, the Battle Phase automatically ends!"
The Sonata closed her mouth as though it had just been wired shut. Yuzu looked as though she'd just been whacked in the face by her own harisen. Tatsuya and Dennis were seen to wipe their brows in relief at the near miss.
But Yuzu didn't let her shock last for long, sliding her last card into her Duel Disk. "One card face-down—and then, I'll activate my Ostinato's second effect," she explained with a look at her Meisterin Schubert, whose body was beginning to glow and vibrate where she stood. "Any Fusion Monster it's used to Summon is destroyed during the End Phase—but in its place," she smirked, "if both that monster's Fusion Materials are still in my Graveyard, I can Special Summon them both to my field right now! So! Aria—Elegy—it's time for an encore! Be reborn!"
She threw out her hand right as Meisterin Schubert's still-shivering body disappeared into the same cloud of mist that had given it birth. The colorful fog dispersed, thinned to nothingness—and in its place stood the same two monsters Masumi had briefly seen before, holding hands: the flighty Aria (Level 4: ATK 1600 » 3100/DEF 1200 » 2700), and the melancholy, queenly Elegy (Level 5: ATK 2000 » 3500/DEF 1200 » 2700).
"Aria and Elegy both have effects that activate when they're Special Summoned," said Yuzu, sweeping a hand from one monster to the other. All five of her monsters had arranged themselves into a star pattern, hovering in a circle around her and crooning a low, wordless adagio. "As long as my Aria's on the field, my Melodious monsters can't be destroyed by battle, or be targeted by card effects! And as for my Elegy, she makes all my Special Summoned Melodious monsters indestructible by card effects—and gives them an extra 300 ATK the moment she's Special Summoned herself!"
Masumi was flabbergasted. Those two monsters had made Yuzu's field as good as invincible. On top of being incredibly strong thanks to her Sonatas—she watched Aria's ATK gauge climb to 3400, Elegy's to 3800, and the Sonatas themselves, the weakest links on that field, to an even 3000—there were very few card effects in the game that could remove monsters from the field without targeting them or destroying them. That wasn't even getting into Yūya's situation—while he'd pulled off the sort of stunning reversals only he could, the fact remained that he still had only one card in his hand. He could still use his Pendulum Scales to re-Summon his field, and his Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon with it, but it simply wasn't strong enough to break through even the weakest of Yuzu's Divas. In fact, there was only monster she could think of that could hope to break this insurmountable field—and the Duelist who used it was on the other side of town, far too late to come to Yūya's rescue even if he wanted to.
To the best of her knowledge, Yūya was—to borrow a crude phrase from Yaiba—completely boned.
That still didn't stop Tatsuya and Futoshi from shouting encouragement to their "onīchan", though. "Come on, Yūya—you got this! We believe in you!" "Shiver those girls right off the stage!"
Ayu, however, was faintly smiling, and reclined in her seat in satisfaction. Masumi knew how much she idolized Yuzu, and wouldn't have been shocked if she'd been rooting for her from the get-go. Dennis looked faintly cautious; every so often, Masumi caught him stealing glimpses at Yūya, perhaps thinking he'd pull another proverbial rabbit out of the hat—only to look back at Yuzu, take one look at her monsters, and shake his head.
And Herman … Masumi felt her teeth grazing at her tongue again. The German didn't look as though he'd moved a muscle ever since the Duel had started. One hand still clutched the briefcase at his feet, but the other clasped his chin in an expression of very deep thought. His deep blue eyes hadn't wavered from the Duel for an instant.
It was enough for the Fusion Duelist to wonder if he'd been seeing the same strange things she had.
She turned her attention back to the Duel right as Yūya drew his card in a grand flourish. "My—TURN!"
This time, she saw it: Yūya had turned to look at the card—and instantly his eyes had flashed a bright purple. Masumi felt her body tense up. If once was merely happenstance, and twice was coincidence …
Three times, Yaiba had told her once, is a conspiracy.
She'd sidled over to Dennis almost without her awareness of it. "Did you see that?" she whispered, so as not to be overheard by the three kids behind them.
Dennis blinked. "See what?"
"Yūya's eyes," Masumi explained. "They just sort of … went flashy just now."
The American was silent for a long moment. Then he smiled. "Oh, they did that all the time way back when," he said. "I probably wouldn't mention it to him, though. He'd find it embarrassing."
Masumi took "way back when" to mean back when Z-ARC had still inhabited Yūya's body. And if she'd been in his shoes, "embarrassing" would have been the last word she'd chosen to describe those days. "But … Z-ARC is gone," she said to Dennis. "Yūya said so himself—he ceased to exist. Went poof."
She leaned in close. "So why would his eyes still be doing that?"
Dennis had no reply. Not that he would have had the time, because—
"LADIES AND GENTLEMEN!"
Instantly, Dennis and Masumi had leaned forward in their seats. Both of them had heard Yūya's iconic preamble enough times to know when to expect a treat.
"Sorry for keeping you all on the edges of your seats for so long!" The You Show ace was waving to the spectators, grinning like his Life Points weren't teetering on a knife's edge. "But you know me—I can never resist a good song and dance. Give a special shout-out to my lovely assistant and her girls! Such lovely, lovely voices they all have."
He tipped a broad wink to Yuzu, who was seen to mouth the words "lovely assistant" in disbelief; her cheeks went more scarlet with every syllable he spoke. She huffed, and turned away with her nose in the air—but Masumi had seen the grudging smile an instant before, and knew she had to be thinking the same thing about Yūya:
Never change, knucklehead.
"That's all for Act Two, folks—and now it's on to the finale! And I'll kick it off with a PENDULUM SUMMON!" He threw out a hand. "From my Extra Deck, I re-Summon my Entermate Trump Girl and my Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon—and from my hand," he added, plucking the card he'd just drawn and slamming it onto his Duel Disk, "let's hear a round of applause for my latest and greatest of wizards—Purple Poison Magician!"
From the shimmering portal that had blossomed over his head, three bolts of energy whirled onto the field. Two were quickly recognizable as the cartoonish Trump Girl (Level 2: ATK 200/DEF 200) and the spiky bulk of Pendulum Dragon (Level 7: ATK 2500/DEF 2000). On the other side of Pendulum Dragon, however, emerged yet another monster that Masumi had never seen before until this Duel: a pale-faced human wearing an earthen-colored smock over his purple suit of armor (Level 4: ATK 1200/DEF 2100). Multiple scarlet orbs had been sewn into the clothing—one of them even tipped the thickly lashed whip that he held in his hand—but most of all, something about his smile gave Masumi goosebumps in ways that had nothing to do with Yūya's ability to put on a show.
"Don't let the name fool you, now," Yūya winked. "He's actually really good with kids. And to prove it, I'll activate my Trump Girl's effect again—only this time, I'll use her as a Fusion Material with my Purple Magician!"
The little girl waved her wand with a giggle, pointing it right at the Magician. Instantly, several things happened: Trump Girl began to fade from view—the last thing that could be seen of her was her toothy grin—but the real spectacle was coming from Purple Poison Magician. For the monster had no sooner placed his whip in a pocket than he'd dropped to all fours: his black gloves were turning into vicious-looking claws, his limbs were contorting, expanding threefold; the clothing was becoming tighter and tighter until it was nothing more than a second skin, and the plates of armor on his shoulders were shifting, grinding, almost gnashing—
"And now—through the magic of one small soul, and the elixir of life and death, point to a new path!"
"Fusion Summon!" Yūya proclaimed. "Appear! Starve Venom Fusion Dragon!"
Masumi felt her breath catch in her lungs as the transformation completed itself. The dragon that had taken Purple Magician's place (Level 8: ATK 2800/DEF 2000) was the least likely monster an entertainer like Sakaki Yūya would have in his Deck. His whip had become a flexible tail, and his robe had become scales, flesh … and more ripping fangs than Masumi had ever wanted to see in five different mouths—four of which had no business being on any creature, let alone a dragon.
But the jaws that protruded from the hips and shoulders of Starve Venom Fusion Dragon mercifully remained shut, for which Masumi was grateful. She had heard of its devastating abilities, of how its original owner had savaged every Duelist he'd ever faced—and was grateful that Yūya had chosen not to use them.
Or, perhaps more accurately, he couldn't use them. Not to win, at least. Because even though Starve Venom's ATK-gaining effect didn't target, the abilities that allowed it to copy another monster's effect did. And even the ATK Starve Venom gained wouldn't be enough to defeat Yuzu this turn; the highest ATK on her field was that of Elegy. In any other Duel, 6600 ATK would be astronomical. But here, it just wouldn't be enough for a one-turn—
"More."
The Fusion Duelist felt as though the bottom had just dropped out of her stomach. The single word she'd just heard—growled in savage, feral pleasure—was all the more unbelievable, because she'd never once imagined that tone of voice coming from Sakaki Yūya.
Which seemed an appropriate assumption to make, because Masumi only needed one look to know that the Duelist standing behind Starve Venom was not Sakaki Yūya.
It had his hair, and his clothes. But the hair was wild and unkempt; his jacket tossed and turned as if he'd stepped inside a tornado. And the face … the smile was wrong. The perfect teeth, the winning grin, were bared in a sneer up at Yuzu, who had backed against the pole supporting her platform as though Yūya had suddenly gone rabid. And if Masumi didn't know better, that might well have been the case.
Except Yūya's eyes—from the whites to the pupils and the ruby-red irises—were now fully and unequivocally glowing the same, venomous-looking purple she'd seen three times already.
Masumi tried to suppress a gulp, failed. That settled it, she thought. Something is very wrong.
Dennis seemed to think so, too. He'd not taken his eyes off Yūya since Starve Venom had been Summoned. "He's in control," he said, in what he must have hoped was a reassuring tone. She wasn't reassured in the slightest.
Neither were the kids. Ayu and Tatsuya were clinging fearfully to Futoshi, who was shivering so violently that he appeared to be vibrating in place—and his friends with him.
"Finally," Yūya growled, his now-fully violet eyes glinting, "we activate the Spell Card: Fusion! With this, we fuse the Starve Venom and the Pendulum Dragon on our field for a Fusion Summon!"
Uh-oh. He's using first-person plural. Masumi bit her lip. She'd never heard Yūya do that personally, but she had vivid memories of someone who had. That someone had come very close to killing four of her friends—including Yaiba—and might well have succeeded had he not underestimated their perseverance.
So to hear this change in tense once more had instantly set her on edge. "He's done that before, too … right?" she asked Dennis. The American shook his head, still mesmerized by the change in the mood of the Duel.
Yūya's two dragons, meanwhile, were nowhere to be seen. The hurricane of color that had erupted out of nowhere above them had already sucked them into its depths, their last earthly remnants being the roars of triumph that echoed in the arena:
"Dragon with dual-colored eyes! Become one with the poisonous dragon. Be the power that leads to supremacy!"
"FUSION SUMMON!" bellowed Yūya. "Appear! Level 10! Dragon with gem-like eyes of kindness! Supreme King Violet Dragon – Odd-Eyes Venom Dragon!"
Spidery limbs emerged from the vortex, one at a time, their foot-long violet claws gauging long furrows in the stage that supported them. A purple, hooked tail lashed outwards, destroying the empty section of bleachers behind it. Two wings, curving upwards with the grace of freshly fallen leaves, unfolded into many scimitar-like blades of pure white that sang in the sudden rush of wind, reached twenty feet and more into the air—and only then did the pincer-tipped, many-eyed head finally emerge with a bone-chilling, yowling roar (Level 10: ATK 3300/DEF 2500).
Masumi was glad she was already sitting down; the mere sight of this monster made her legs feel like rubber. The Fusion Pendulum Monster—only one of two she had ever seen in her entire lifetime, and would likely ever see for as long as she lived—outclassed even her best Gem-Knights by whole orders of magnitude. The right hand and field might be able to give her a Master Dia that was even stronger, but it wasn't just sheer strength that made Masumi feel so terrified of this monster. The look and feel of any Duel Monster—the psychological thrill of base fear—could accomplish more than even the highest ATK score or the most devastating of effects—
A scream from Ayu shattered her train of thought. The little girl was pointing at Yūya with a trembling finger. Her face was livid with fright.
The Fusion Duelist followed the finger … and felt her jaw drop. What in the actual hell?!
Yūya's eyes were still glowing, and his hair was still whipping about every which way. The intensity and the color, however, had changed. His right eye was still glowing as violet as ever—but his left eye was now a vivid teal green. Masumi, however, only had eyes for what was now on Yūya's forehead: a pair of crimson chevrons, just above his eyebrows—and between them, a single vertical slit of burning scarlet, almost like a third eye was trying to open—
She heard Dennis gulp. The American spoke two words that made her gulp just as loudly: " … That's new."
The Fusion Duelist was just about to ask why Dennis was acting so flippantly in the face of extreme danger—of how he could possibly take a complete personality change within one of his best friends so in stride—
… Wait.
The gears in her brain began to turn. Years of experience had given Masumi the feeling of carving a gemstone, of visualizing the entire process from the rough rock to be ground out, sanded away, lapped at, and finally polished until she was left with the sparkling jewel that her mind's eye had envisioned from the beginning.
Grind.
Yūya, she already knew, had different personalities, and the early days of them learning to coexist with one another had been … decidedly unsettling. But after Academia had fallen, and their progenitor Z-ARC had been erased, they had learned to work in harmony with one another during a Duel. The same, she presumed, held true for Yuzu—and yet both of them had departed from their original happy selves over the course of this Duel. Yuzu had shown a penchant for destruction in trying to take out Yūya's last hundred Life Points, and Yūya himself was …
Sand.
She took a closer look at Yūya's glowing, multicolored eyes. Yes, she was sure of it now; those weren't any typical shades of purple and green—it was Fusion purple … and Pendulum green.
Lap.
Events replayed in her head. Yūya had Summoned a new Fusion Monster, Odd-Eyes Vortex Dragon; that had been the first time she'd thought his eyes had changed color. Yuzu had done the same thing with her Meisterin Schubert just one turn later. And finally, Yūya had Fusion Summoned Starve Venom Fusion Dragon, which she had been told was the ace monster of his Fusion Dimension counterpart, Yūri … and had gone further still with his Odd-Eyes Venom Dragon …
Polish.
Four Fusion Monsters, Masumi had counted over the course of this Duel, each more powerful than the last one. Four changes in eye color, each more extreme than the last. A complete change in mood in both combatants—from pale and drained to happy-go-lucky; from utter bliss to practically salivating at the thought of victory at any cost, no matter how much destruction it caused. And all of it had seemed to happen after—
…
Et voilà.
…
After they'd been interviewed.
Slowly, as if bracing for a massive shock, Masumi's eyes turned towards Herman von Stadion, wondering for the first time just what had happened after he'd gone off alone with Yūya and Yuzu.
Because now she was convinced something more was happening here—and that somehow, this German strongman, for all his pomp and bluster, knew something about it. His eyes had a look to them she'd never seen in him before; a spark was dancing deep within that lapis-lazuli gaze.
"Wunderschönen … " Masumi didn't need to know any German to guess what that word might mean. Herman's eyes told her everything; he wasn't scared—he wasn't even excited. It was a look of pure, calculated satisfaction.
He'd wanted this to happen.
Masumi stood up, ignoring the numbness in her legs. Something dangerous was going on here, and she needed answers before someone got hurt … or worse.
She had to stop this Duel.
But Yūya no longer seemed content to wait. He'd leapt from his platform as if he'd grown wings, soaring far too high, and landing far too lightly on top of his Venom Dragon, for his movements to be human.
He'd then turned his tri-chromatic gaze downward for a brief moment, like he'd just seen something on the floor far below—and then kicked at his steed's collarbone. At once, violet flames erupted beneath the scimitar-like growths of the dragon's wings, and monster and rider now sped towards one corner of the stage in a blur of color and sound.
Moments later: "Action Magic: Pendulum Boost!" Yūya's hiss of a voice sounded more appropriate for the dragon he'd mounted than for the ace student of the You Show Duel School. "With this card, I can destroy every monster in my Pendulum Zones, and have 1 monster I control gain 100 ATK times their combined Levels! By destroying my Level 7 Dragonpit and my Level 4 Dragonpulse"—both magicians, still hovering high above the Dueling field, disintegrated into a million shards of hard-light—"my Odd-Eyes Venom Dragon therefore gains 1100 ATK!"
The amethyst-colored inferno that Venom Dragon had been using to maneuver about the field now washed over its own body, and it roared its horrid, keening shriek again as its ATK gauge rose to 4400—
"And then," growled Yūya, "for each Pendulum Scale I destroyed, my Venom Dragon will gain 1 additional attack this turn! Which means exactly what you think—this Duel's OVER!
"BATTLE PHASE!" he roared. "Odd-Eyes Venom Dragon, attack all three Sonatas at once!"
With one flap of its flaming wings, Venom Dragon hurtled into the far reaches of the tent, shrinking until it was little more than a solitary, violet star. Masumi, turning back towards the Duel, caught the animal snarl of triumph on Yūya's smile—
WHAM.
Venom Dragon's attack bathed Yuzu and her monsters in flames. Aria and Elegy had leapt out of the blast radius in time, but none of the three Sonatas had a prayer. Yūya had deliberately targeted them, Masumi knew, because while they could not be destroyed by battle, Yuzu would still take the damage—1400 points of it a pop, even before taking the loss of each of their ATK-increasing effects into account.
Which meant that the girl was blasted right off her platform, careening into a section of bleachers that collapsed from the force of the attack. Masumi just barely heard the shriek of her Duel Disk that meant her Life Points had just reached zero.
Yūya, however, had no time to savor his victory. Scarcely had the smoke cleared when the blazing glow in his eyes faded, leaving them as ruby-red as they'd always been. The eye on his forehead—if it had been an eye at all—had disappeared as well.
A second later, Yūya's eyes rolled upwards, and he toppled to his platform, spark out.
There being no further use for it, Athletic Circus disappeared from the arena. Moments later, Hīragi Shūzō had sprinted out of the control room and straight for his daughter. Yuzu was supine, completely still, and looked as though she'd just lost consciousness herself.
Dennis was uncharacteristically silent. Ayu, Futoshi, and Tatsuya were dividing their gazes between the boy and girl they worshipped like superheroes. None of them dared speak owing to their own fear, and Masumi took advantage of the lull in silence to cross the distance between her and Herman von Stadion in a matter of seconds.
The German had just finished latching his briefcase shut, and was moving to stand when Masumi's shadow fell across his chest. The Fusion Duelist's face was pure thunder.
"Out with it," she snarled through clenched teeth, low enough that the kids wouldn't hear. "What did you do to them?"
Herman sighed, and drew himself to his full height. "It would appear," he said, "that I vastly underestimated the stress I placed upon them by coming here today."
Masumi narrowed her eyes. "I was watching you the whole Duel," she whispered as malevolently as her voice would let her. It was a lie, but she'd seen enough to feel comfortable with taking the chance that Herman didn't know. "You had every chance to stop the Duel at the first sign of trouble. You never did. I want to know why."
Herman had actually backed away a step, which surprised Masumi—but not to the extent that she'd forgotten why.
Then a new sound reached her ears, one that really did make her forget about what had happened for a split second. It was coming from somewhere outside: a low-pitched, discordant klaxon, slowly but steadily rising, then falling in pitch. She had been through enough exercises in school to know what that noise was.
"Masumi—" She whirled around at Ayu. The little girl was chalk-white. "That's the air-raid siren!"
That was when the school intercom clicked to life. But the fatherly voice of Hīragi Shūzō did not echo from the speakers; instead, there was a cool female voice wholly at odds with the message she was delivering.
"All students and staff, proceed along evacuation routes in a calm and orderly fashion towards your designated shelters. All response teams please report immediately to your assigned command station. This is not a drill."
The Fusion Duelist's heart had leapt into her throat. "We're under attack?!" Her mind had suddenly turned to mush. "From who—what?"
She heard a string of whispered German. Herman was crossing himself; he had gone completely rigid. The reason why was soon clear; Dennis had switched on his Duel Disk, apparently hoping to find out who was attacking them.
The American's face looked the color of badly mixed porridge. He was shaking his head. "That's impossible … "
Leo Duel School
Akaba Himika had stood up from her chair the moment she'd heard the sirens. The window of her office overlooked a large chunk of Maiami City—which meant that the headmistress of LDS knew precisely why those sirens were going off before the evacuation order had already begun.
She stared at the street below, and the enormous construction of metal that had appeared in the crossroads directly in front of her school, quite out of nowhere. Heavily armored shoulders, pectorals and gauntlets, navy blue and styled like snarling hounds, dripped flames from their jaws. Massive cogs churned within its innards. A single mechanical eye burned within its tiny head, shining like a laser this way and that.
Her eyes were already traveling throughout the city. Within seconds she saw another one several blocks away. Then two on the same street … three in one neighborhood, no, four … five …
Himika felt her heart pounding. Only in the corner of her eye did she notice the stately, elderly woman who presided over the Endymion Duel School walk up to her, her face etched with fear. Manicured nails, freshly painted, had clapped against her mouth.
"Himika?" She heard an audible swallow. "What is that?"
She answered her counterpart truthfully—she had heard too many of Reiji's reports to do otherwise. But it offered no explanation for why it was here … to say nothing of who had sent it here … and the many questions they begged.
Chaos Giants, Himika repeated in her head. They're all Antique Gear Chaos Giants …
A/N: Busy, busy, busy. Work's been leaving me with very little time to write this past month, and a lot less time to catch any problem spots. I'll see about addressing those in a couple days.
The interview scene in this chapter was by far one of the more challenging I've had to write in a long while. Not only because of how I wanted it to unfold from that person's point of view, but also how to do so convincingly. I think I spent less time writing the whole Duel after it than I did writing that one small bit.
Things are heating up pretty quickly now. Rate and review if you like, and thanks for reading! – K