"This duel isn't going like you thought it would," Selene taunted with a smirk. "What, were you expecting me to wither under the 'manly might' you and your little pawn thrust at me?"

She was the goddess of the moon. A titan. She had been born long before Crump or the real Vencent or anyone else had ever existed and she would remain when they were little more than ashes. Her form, her true form, fully revealed, would allow her to crush the entire floating fortress they were currently trapped in under foot and barely even feel it.

But… much like her Mai persona… she knew the frustrations of a male-dominated society.

First had been the likes of Cronos believing that all had to do as he commanded because he was the father of the Titans. That he was to be respected no matter how utterly stupid his ideas were and that any that dared to talk back to him should be at once punished. Selene had seen many titanesses brought to task by him, both verbally and physically; she had been smart though, knowing when to act and when to retreat to avoid the blow. She was not one of Cronos' children so she avoided the dangers of his paranoia… but she knew there was always a chance her mad uncle might decide to swallow her whole, along with the rest of his children that he had named 'gods' rather than 'titans'.

But it still annoyed her all the same.

When Zeus had taken the throne things had little changed. The mortals believed that he at least listened to Athena but the way he would rape goddesses, show utter disrespect for his wife, and openly mock any goddess that tried to tell him he was wrong… well, it showed why the myths and songs were dead wrong about him. And it was the same for all others too. Ares… well, he had received the short end of the stick when it came to the mortals and Athena, the bitch, had ruined the reputation of Selene's cousin but he still openly laughed at the idea that any woman was even 'beneath' him as that made it seem like they had a hope of reaching for him. Hephaestus played up being lame (she swore that limp had changed legs at least twice) but treated Aphroditie as a trophy and bellowed that no goddess was allowed in his forge. Hades and his bride… oh, the mortals now had made it that there was some great love affair between the two but the 'Queen of the Underworld' was little more than a slave that got her freedom for 6 months.

Mai had suffered such treatment too in the modern world. Looked at as being stupid and vapid just because of her looks. She had decided to play into such things because sometimes it worked to make your weakness into a strength but it still bothered her greatly. It was why Selene, in both her personas, loved Endymion… loved Edwin. As Endymion he had been able to stand up to her without domination. A fine dance he had done well. As Edwin he had known when to defend her and when to allow her to destroy her enemies.

'But he is the exception, not the rule,' she thought darkly. 'Joey Wheeler… he so easily accepted that Mai must be some damsel in distress. Didn't believe that I could ever stand up for myself.'

(It didn't matter that SHE was the one that put that idea in his head. Even if somewhere deep, very deep, within her psyche, where the part of her that was pure Mai, screamed in outrage that her games had only hurt everyone instead of helping them.)

'Marik. Kaiba. Noah. The Big 5. All think that I am a lesser.' Selene narrowed her eyes. 'And they will all learn how wrong they are.'

"Actually," Vencent said, pulling her from her thoughts, "this duel is going just about as I saw. Would you agree, Mr. Crump?"

"Very much so!" Crump declared with a grin. "She's a skilled duelist but the duel has only just started!"

"She is also standing right here," Selene said darkly.

That caused Vencent to shrug. "If you wish for me to pay attention to you I can. But I warn you that you might not like what happens when I do." He drew his next card. "That was a very neat trick, turning a non-tuner into a tuner. But I'm afraid you stole that from me, even if you didn't realize it. You see, when I resurrected my White Sardine last turn its effect activated, turning it into a Tuner. And now I will use Reborn the Monster-"

"Its called Monster Reborn," Selene commented, one sculpted eyebrow raised at his word choice.

"Is it?" Crump said. "I thought it was Reborn the Monster."

"It used to be called that but Pegasus decided to change the name," said Vencemt. "Some of the older players, such as myself, have the original version of that card and thus prefer to call it Reborn the Monster. There is something… timeless… about it."

"Well, it will be a relic because it is something that isn't going to happen any more. As Reborn the Monster OR as Monster Reborn!" Selene thrust out her hand. "I use my Cyber Slash Harpie Lady's effect, which allows me to negate and destroy one of your cards when its effect is activated. Meaning that whatever you were bringing back from the graveyard gets to remain there."

"Fair enough," Vencent stated. "Then I will just use my deck master's ability: Ice Capsule. This allows me, at the cost of 500 lifepoints, to return one of my monsters to the field from my graveyard. So I will still be bringing back my White Sunfish. And I am afraid there is no bonus or reward for you guessing what happens next." The White Sardine swam straight up into the air, like a salmon going up a waterfall, before it turned into a ring of light. The White Sunfish launched itself right after the White Sardine, turning into a beam of energy that entered into the ring, causing the creation of a brand new White monster.

The new fish was truly gigantic. Easily the 30 feet long the massive whale slammed down to the ground, swimming through the air before finally coming to hover next to Vencent. It had golden fins (or were they flippers? Selene had left fish to Poseidon to deal with) and had a regal bearing. This was a creature that countless fishermen would have thrown their lives away trying to catch. A beast that would have haunted their dreams and fed a thousand tall tales. Almost… godly… in a sense. Not that it was a god but rather that it reminded Selene of some of the fanciful creatures the Olympians had created in their boredom, just to see if they could. Lions with silver manes and bulls that were made of living bronze. (Vencent-3500)

"And when such a beast appears… well, naturally it will upset the waters greatly. Its arrival on the field sends out a tidal wave that washes over your Cyber Slash Harpie Lady, destroying it!"

Selene grit her teeth in frustration, eyes narrowing as her monster shattered into bits.

"Well done, Vencent, well done!" Crump declared. "You've truly shown your skill!"

"You act as if he cares what you have to say," Selene commented. "He is an avatar of a real person… but only an avatar. He isn't real. He doesn't exist."

"He's as real as you or I," Crump argued. "Who cares how he came into being. He is alive now and that is all that matters."

Selene frowned at that. "You order him around like a puppet."

"He does no such thing," Vencent stated. "Unlike the other avatars I am completely unaltered."

"…what?"

Vencent nodded. "Yes. While the likes of Nezbit, Gangsly, and the rest have tinkered with the minds of my fellow avatars I remain exactly like my original self is in the real world. Or perhaps was… I obviously don't know what is going on with him…"

Selene just stared at Vencent for a long while. "You… you want me to believe for a second that this monster allowed you to keep your free will?!"

"Monster!" Crump exclaimed, sounding very offended. "I am not the monster here."

"You want to steal my body."

"If I could return to my own body I would," Crump declared. "Sadly I can not as it was damaged during the transfer process. But the world will be a better place with you removed from it, Miss Valentine. You and the rest of your evil friends."

And that's when it hit Selene.

Crump… thought he was the hero of this story.

'What the fuck?' she could practically hear Edwin screaming.

~MC~MC~MC~

Ishizu continued to prowl through the vessel, her mood growing more and more sour as the seconds ticked by. Everything about the structure was… wrong. It was the very representation of the corruption of the world. A place of cold steel, where no heat was generated and sounds were muffled. Where the only air that blew was from fans and it tasted of old dust and metal shavings. A disgusting place that didn't know the warmth of the sun. Even the tombs she had called home had held onto the memories of the surface. They had felt lived in, even as they served as the resting places for her noble ancestors.

'This can not be called a tomb because there was never even an echo of life,' she thought to herself as she easily avoided going down one hall that would have left her dealing with one of Noah's security systems. A turret that would have fired upon her… while she would have been able to defeat it by casting some magic upon it to befuddle its simple systems and allow her to shatter it into pieces it was a needless waste of time when she could simply move to the next door and, using the keypad there and the knowledge of the codes her Millennium Necklace was showing her bypass the entire thing. 'The dead still hold the whispers of the lives they once lived. But here… there is nothing. There is no soul in this place. Or at least there wasn't until we arrived.'

Ishizu narrowed her eyes.

'This is the world that Yugi Muto and his silly little friends want to save?'

She knew it would be easy for people to misunderstand her quest. To believe that she wanted to save the world. She did, of course. But it wasn't merely from Zorc she wished to save it from.

'I will save it from this corruption. I will bring it back to how it should have always remained. When the Pharaoh defeats the dark god he will be blessed with the powers that are befitting him as an immortal trapped in a mortal shell. He was raze these gaudy cities and return the lands to nature. The rivers will flow free and clear once again. The people will set aside their distractions and find fulfillment in the fields once again. They will remember how to work with their hands and how to build things that will truly last. And they will praise the Pharaoh for his efforts-'

She opened a door and let out a cry as she encountered someone else. At once her eyes glowed and she lifted up her hands, firing off whips of golden sand from her palms to wrap around and strangle the intruder.

The looming death god merely caught the tendril like it was a naughty child's wrist and held firm.

"There is no need for that," Brom Bones declared.

Ishizu considered him for a long moment… and then relaxed, releasing her attack.

Brom was different from Selene. While not an Egyptian god he was still a god of death. Like… a cousin to Horus and Ra. While it was true that she had thought poorly of him when she'd first learned of his divine status her opinion on him had changed. Yes, he had seemed to ally with Endymion… but that did not mean he was an enemy of the Pharaoh. In fact he seemed to be rather concerned with her brother's actions, protecting a young woman who worked for Kaiba from her brother's dark desires.

'The gods are fickle and their ways are hard to understand,' she reminder herself. 'While the likes of Selene see no problem with tying themselves to one as dark as Endymion, so that it blinds them to all else, the same is not true, perhaps, for Brom.'

It helped that Selene had gathered glimpses of his past. Not of actions he himself had taken; Brom was simply too powerful for even her item and she had been unable to breach through the defenses he had, most likely without thought, created for himself and his past. But she had been able to find the places where he appeared as a hole in history and view what those around him thought and felt.

And what she had seen was a misunderstood god who had found himself utterly alone.

'After all,' she thought to herself, 'mighty Osiris and Ra honor my brother despite his actions. His disgraces himself but he is still of the blood of Ancient Egypt and thus deserves to be considered and blessed by them. He wouldn't be able to wield The Winged Dragon of Ra otherwise. Others would see that as them being cruel and wicked… but their methods are their own. Same as Brom.' Ishizu paused. 'And there is the matter of his companion,' she thought, glancing at Rex Raptor.

Another that Endymion had been in contact with but not one that had become part of his inner circle like Yuri Gardner or that horrid beast Renard Volpe. Nor was he part of Vessel's group of friends. Rex Raptor was a true outsider and while he would never be allowed to be truly her ally, for she could only side with those that had proven themselves worthy through deeds and by blood to deserve a place in the court of the Pharaoh… perhaps she had been blind and deaf to the aid she might receive from the likes of him. After all, if Seto Kaiba could prove to be unworthy despite being the Priest Set's reincarnation… why not an outsider be worthy to assist her?

Thus Ishizu, realizing who was standing in the doorway, quickly dipped her head. "Pardons, Brom Bones… I didn't realize who it was. There are many enemies in this fortress."

"No harm done," the death god rumbled. "So you too weren't selected by Noah Kaiba?"

"No," Ishizu stated.

"Can't decide if you're annoyed or grateful for that," Rex joked and Ishizu considered his comment before seeing the logic in it. Yes… it was hard to decide if she should be angered at the disrespect she was shown… or pleased that she had avoided the trap and was now free to aid the Pharaoh. "We're lookin' to find the others and blow this place."

"You are welcome to join us… assuming you can behave."

"The Pharaoh is in danger," Ishizu stated, holding her head up high. "That makes Noah Kaiba an enemy of the tombkeepers."

But Brom merely stared her down. "You will swear to me."

She understood at once that this pledge was something she couldn't take lightly. "In what words?"

"You will swear that you will not harm ANYONE from the blimp." He added, almost like an afterthought but she knew it not to be, "Be it mental, physical, or spiritual."

Ishizu at once frowned. "I can not swear that."

"Then you will not be able to join us. Furhtermore, if you are a danger to those I seek to free then I will act."

'I will be dead before I can even draw forth a single tendril from the Shadow Realm,' she thought. "You must be fair, Death God. You ask for eternity."

Brom considered that for a long moment.

"What if," Rex chimed in, "the deal is just for until we leave this stupid sub?"

Ishizu at once nodded. "That would be acceptable. A temporary truce."

"…a temporary truce," Brom echoed before staring her down. "Swear it."

"I, Ishizu Ishtar, give my word that I will not harm any, mind, body, or soul, who were on the blimp before we were captured, until such time as we are free and have left this place."

"So it shall be," Brom rumbled and Ishizu felt… nothing. No lightning bolt from the Heavens. No great pulse in her veins. Just… nothing.

But she also knew that her word had been given and she couldn't break it.

With a nod she motioned for Brom to begin leading the way.

~MC~MC~MC~

"You… honestly believe you are in the right here?" Selene found herself asking.

This mortal. This short dumpy mortal. This potato of a man. He was daring to claim that HE was the good one. That his cause was just.

She stared at him in open shock.

"…you worked for Gozaburo Kaiba."

"I did," Crump stated.

"He was a weapon's manufacturer."

That made Crump shrug. "I just did the accounting. I didn't decide what the money was spent on. Do you blame the janitor who worked for Seto Kaiba for him kidnapped Yugi's grandpa?"

~MC~MC~MC~

Moose, head of janitorial services and current acting head of KaibaCorp, suddenly looked up.

"Is there a problem… sir?" Martin asked, still finding it odd to call the man that.

"No… no, I think I'm good. Now, let's talk about merchandising." He twisted his head towards the newly brought in Head of Product Development, Non-Card Division. "I'm thinking body pillows."

"Yeah," Tom, the department head, said with a sigh, "I kinda figured that. Dark Magician Girl, Mystical Elf, Amazoness Queen-"

"Thinking too small. Lot of women and gay men that would like to cuddle the Dark Magician."

"Why not a Red-Eyes?" Aria stage whispered from the door.

"That too," Moose said.

"YAY!"

~MC~MC~MC~

"I understand that there are many people who don't like that he made weapons. I wasn't a fan of it myself but I understand that there is a demand for such things. And many times they are needed to protect the peace. How many tin pot despots would be in control of countries, authorizing rape and murder, if Gozaburo Kaiba hadn't been there to provide soldiers with the guns and body armor needed to protect their homelands?"

Selene just stared at the man, trying to decide if he was bringing up a good point or if he was just crazy. It was possible it was both… she had found that both immortals and mortals could be both mad and sane at the same time. The less said of that one week her Endymion had tried his hand at pottery, for example…

She shook that thought away. "Gozaburo Kaiba abused his son."

"He never laid a hand on young Noah. He loved him and he was grieved greatly when he became ill."

"I meant Seto Kaiba."

"Oh, he abused Seto Kaiba, did he?" Crump said with a laugh. "Have you MET Seto Kaiba? I have… I knew him when he was a little boy, no older than poor sweet Mokuba. That boy HUNGERED for challenges and didn't like being denied. Mr. Kaiba bemoaned almost daily that Seto was blasting through every assignment he gave him, that he refused to sleep or eat., that he was completing tasks that should have taken weeks in hours because he thought it was all part of some grand 'test'." Crump shook his head. "No… no, Seto was only 'abused' if you believe that he abused himself through his drive to usurp Gozaburo."

Selene frowned at that. She could… she could see Seto doing all of that, honestly. The teen was so bullheaded and stubborn that it wasn't hard to believe that he would get it in that thick skull of his that Gozaburo was testing him and he could only 'prove' himself by completing everything at an ungodly short amount of time. In fact, the more Selene thought of it the more she could see Seto deciding that he had to do it purely because he as told he shouldn't.

'I'm agreeing with Crump,' she thought, horrified. "And yet you betrayed him," she pointed out.

"I said I didn't agree with all of what Mr. Kaiba was doing. But I wasn't about to quit… I needed to support myself and the many charities I supported." Before Selene could press him on THAT Crump continued on. "When Seto came to us with his ideas of improving Kaibacorp I was the first to sign on. I felt it was wonderful that he wanted to move out of weapons manufacturing!" He frowned, scratching his chin. "I'll admit I don't quite know why the rest of the board agreed to go along with that plan… they had to have seen that they would be in a diminished role…"

Selene shut her eyes for a moment. 'Is this what Edwin feels like every day?' she thought to herself. "You tried to have Seto killed."

"I was horrified when I learned Pegasus had ordered that. I felt that we should buy Seto out and allow him to start his own company. The benefits package that I had written up for him was more than generous-"

"You kidnapped Mokuba."

Now Crump stared at her dryly. "We took a pre-teen out of an empty mansion after his brother seemingly committed suicide and took him to an island paradise where he got to stay in a castle."

Selene opened her mouth only to snap it shut. "…okay, you have a point there," the goddess admitted. "But what about the Virtual World?"

"What about it?"

"You tried to steal our bodies… you want to steal them now!"

"If I could return to my own body I would," Crump said. "As for all of you… your crimes may have been ignored by the authorities but not by me! I see you for what you really are, Miss Valentine! I know how you tried to cheat in Duelist Kingdom! How you robbed that casino in Vegas-"

"It was in Reno, that doesn't count," Selene complained.

"-lied about your age, honeypotted rich men into bringing you into their homes and then revealing you weren't of legal age."

Selene frowned at that. 'Since when is 12 not the legal age? Stupid modern world.'

Crump puffed up his chest at that. "And that is just you! The rest of your friends are just as bad… if not worse! Seto Kaiba attacked that poor Solomon Muto and put him in the hospital-"

'He did do that,' Selene mentally admitted.

"-Joey Wheeler, while never convicted, was suspected in over 30 petty thefts." Selene hadn't realized before he had gotten his head out of his ass Joey had been that bad… but honestly him shaking down kids for their lunch money was something she knew he had done. "Yugi Muto has been linked to multiple murders…"

"I suppose the Pharaoh did get a bit Punishment-Game-Happy in Season Zero…" she blinked, twisting her head away from Crump. "How did I know that?" She shook her head, wondering just how much Edwin's time in another universe had truly affected her. "And you'll now bring up Edwin burning those people to death but he had a good reason to do that and you weren't going to bring that up." She stared at Crump who looked utterly horrified.

"I was going to bring up him committing time card fraud, the worst fraud there is! But he BURNED PEOPLE ALIVE?!"

"…let's… let's just get back to the duel, okay?" Selene said weakly, wanting to get back onto stable ground.

"I… yes…" Crump said, looking a bit green around the gills. "I think you are… he burned them?"

"Let it go they're dead!" Selene thundered, thrusting out her hand. "I am tired of you daring to question me! My Edwin! And dare I admit it… yes, my FRIENDS! They have made mistakes, yes, but so have you, Crump! You sided with a vile monster and despite how you try and twist it about the fact will always remain that you are allied with one that is trying to steal our bodies and take over our lives. Well, that isn't going to happen! I am going to defeat you and then I will bring the wrath of the gods upon you and you will PRAY for mercy that I will never give!" She tapped her duel disc. "I activate my Deck Master's second ability: The Cost of Destruction!"

Her deck master flared out her wings, unleashing beams of light from her feathers that struck the spot where her Cyber Slash Harpie Lady had been standing moments earlier. The spot began to glow and Selene smirked as she saw Vencent's befuddlement.

"This effect makes it that all Effect Destruction is treated as Battle Destruction."

Vencent, for his part, didn't look all that befuddled at all by the move. "There must be then some effect you wish to activate that requires that monster to have been destroyed during Battle."

"Puzzled that out all on your own?" Selene teased as she tapped her duel disc. "I activate my face down, Alluring Mirror Split!" The light that had struck Cyber Slash Harpie Lady's final standing point shimmered, revealing a mirror that still held the image of the Syncro monster. But as the glass began to break the separated shards depicted different Harpie Ladies, with wildly unique hair cuts and weapons, each one grinning as they stared down Vencent and his White Aura Whale. "Once per turn, if a Harpie Lady is destroyed by battle, I can summon directly from my deck a new Harpie Lady, so long as it has a different name. And I am going to do just that: Come forth, Harpie Perfumer!"

The elegant looking Harpie appeared on the field, bowing before settling into defense position, even as a pink cloud gathered around her filled with rose petals and other fragrant materials drifted above in the mist.

"And when this card is summoned I get to add one card from my deck to my hand." She smiled at that, her duel disc spitting out the card she wanted without her needing to give a command. 'The benefits of the Virtual World, I suppose… everything is just a mental command here. I could have used my powers to command the card to appear but this was far easier.' Out loud she stated. "And that will protect me easily enough from your Whale and its attack."

"It might," Vencent said with a nod. "Might, being the key word, seeing as White Aura Whale can attack twice per turn, meaning that your monster is about to be utterly crushed and then you as well. Now then-"

But Selene wasn't done yet. "I activate Harpie Feather Storm!" she slapped the trap down onto the field. "I can play this directly from my hand and when I do it negates the effect of your monster. Too bad… I think that was the closest you were going to come to notching a victory."

Vencent merely commanded his White Aura Whale to attack the Harpie Perfumer, the monster only bowing her head and closing her eyes before the giant white and gold whale slammed down, jaws opened wide as it inhaled the Harpie whole, shattering it into bits. "But your wall has been defeated and you are left defenseless once again."

"Am I though?" Selene asked.

"Plotting something else?" Vencent asked. "Go ahead and do so. This turn showed that I can more than easily shatter anything you put in my way. For all your bluster you are the one with an empty field and my White Aura Whale remains poised to defeat you next turn when your Harpies Feather Storm is gone."

"And for all your comments about breaking my wall… I'm the one whose lifepoints keep increasing." She looked to her Deck Master, her lifepoints jumping up once more. (Selene-4400)

"A droplet from the sky does not make an ocean, nor do a few life points allow you to achieve a grand victory." Vencent shook his head. "Do you want to know what this sounds like to me?"

"Not really."

"Bluster," he commented. "For all your claims that you are some goddess… you are acting no different than any other mortal that might face me. Entirely human."

Selene quirked an eyebrow at that. "is that supposed to scare me? Or be an insult?" But even as she said it she couldn't help but wonder if he was right. 'I do feel odd… different. It is like when I am Mai but I am holding all my memories. Is it… is it something about this world? Or being unable to tap into my powers? Has this affected me and caused the humanity that has grown in Mai to develop in me?'

It was an… interesting concept.

One she would explore the moment she left the Virtual World a burning ruin with only Noah's dying screams to mark that anything had once existed in there with an ounce of intelligence.

~MC~MC~MC~

"Miss Gardner. Mr. Taylor. I do apologize for all of this."

Tea and Tristan shared a look. When they had been ushered into the building they had been expecting many things. But to find a man in a suit sitting at a long table hadn't been one of them. The room looked like any lawyer's office one might have seen in the real world and Tea and Tristan had both separately been in such offices plenty of times. For Tea it was when her father took her along as he shook hands with prosecutors and discussed cases that, at the time, she hadn't bothered to pay attention too but now really wished she had. For Tristan it was mostly his father getting advice on legal matters concerning the furniture business.

That kind of standard office was what the two had found themselves in. Wood paneling. Law degrees hung on the wall. Book cases that were filled with leather-bond tomes. The massive wooden desk that looked better designed for 20 people to sit down upon rather than a few. And the man that could only be a lawyer, with his glasses perched on his sharp nose, his suit perfectly pressed, and a smile that was a pale mockery of a grin.

"Please, take a seat. I would offer refreshments but as I'm sure you both have become aware of food as no taste in the virtual world."

"Edwin told us about that," Tea stated as she made no move to sit down. "You know… when you ordered my father to stab him to death."

"I ordered no such thing," the man stated. "But we are getting ahead of ourselves. I am Phillip Johnson, former lawyer for the Kaiba Corporation. And I was hopeful we might sit down and discuss how we bring this unfortunate situation to a safe end."

"You let us go and we never see you again," Tristan commented, poking the table with his finger.

"Acceptable," Johnson said.

Tristan glanced at Tea.

She stared back.

"Uh… come again?"

"Can I be honest with you both?" he said. "You weren't my choices. I researched all of you and neither of you were on my list to be brought into the Virtual World, let alone be targets for myself and my associates. Unfortunately you are here now and that is why I want to work out a way for you to leave here so you don't ruin what we are seeking to do."

"In other words," Tea said with a huff, "you want to make sure we don't step in and ruin things when you go to steal someone else's body."

"Well, yes."

Tea huffed. "We aren't going to let you take our friends either!"

"Acceptable. Joseph Wheeler was high on my list of beneficial candidates but not a deal breaker."

"Beneficial?" Tristan asked.

"I examined which people would be the least missed as well as those we felt had wasted their lives. I also factored in those whose lives involve entanglements that might cause us problems in altering their current paths… it would do no good if I personally selected Joseph as it wouldn't be believable that he decided to study law. I would have to be desperate to go after him for myself."

"We aren't going to let you take anyone!" Tea shouted.

"And why not?" Johnson pressed. "What do you know of Pegasus? Other than he kidnapped Mokuba Kaiba and Solomon Muto? What of Koyo Hibiki? You met him… several days ago? Rex Raptor? Seto Kaiba… will you truly stand here and tell me that Seto Kaiba would be fighting to save you if it were your lives on the line? Come now, use some logic."

"Its not right!" Tristan snapped.

"And it is right to risk the lives of your friends for people who don't care about you?" Johnson pressed. "Do you weep over the monster you tribute in order to summon your stronger monster? Of course not. That is their purpose. The same with this. We will claim new bodies… we have had years to prepare for this event. The only question is if you are willing to gamble that my associates won't get to your friends first while you stand here passing judgment on me."

He paused.

"Or you can sit down like mature adults and save those you care about, guaranteeing that they are protected along with yourselves."

Tea and Tristan stared at each other for a long moment.

And then… they both took seats at the table.

~MC~MC~MC~

Chaosverse Omake

Thank you for Accel for writing this!

"Please Meijin, right this way. The first round will begin momentarily." an employee of Yajima Trading stated as they held open the door to a private viewing booth. A curt nod was given in reply as the man stepped through, appraising eyes concealed beneath a visor sweeping across the venue chosen to host the East Tokyo Qualifying Rounds for the All Japan Under 19 Gunpla Battle Championship. As Meijin Kawaguchi the Third looked out across the teams of three representing the various schools, academies and clubs across the region, he couldn't help but smile at the thrill of tension and excitement racing through the air. That was when his gaze happened upon a secluded corner to the shocking sight of a particular man speaking to one of the teams. An infamous player on the National level, spoken of alongside the likes of Ricardo Fellini, Niels Yajima, Yasaka Mao, even himself! What could he possibly be doing here?

"Alright you three, huddle up! Now I know this year has been an…adjustment for you, just like it was for me eight years ago. Dropped off in a strange place, not knowing anyone, nothing being the way you remember-"

"Actually this part is just like home! Just smaller, you know?" a cocky grin stretched the face of a blond spiky haired teen, red jacket shifting as his hands cupped behind his head, his teammates and coach giving him a perfect trio of flat stares.

"...You killed it Bit. You killed the moment. Just…just get up on the stage." a long suffering sigh escaped the man's lips as he reached up to massage his temples, waving the young men forward to take their places.

One member who was dressed in what must have been their school uniform, a matching set of black shirt and pants trimmed in gold with long black locks and shockingly vibrant purple eyes simply shook his head while the other, a pale young man with slicked back black hair wearing a full three piece suit and carrying a briefcase smacked their irreverent teammate upside the back of his head as they took their place at one of the four combat stations.

"You always feel the need to push it, don't you Bit?"

"Ah lay off Lulu, you both take things way too seriously! Someone here needs to know what "fun" is."

"How many times do I need to tell you not to call me that!"

"Enough the both of you, let's get down to business." the teen in the suit interrupted, slinging his briefcase up into the space between them as the clasps flicked open, letting the two bickering teammates claim their respective machines.

"Thanks again for tuning them Roger!"

Whatever further words the team might have shared were cutoff as the speakers across the event hall crackled to life.

"Now for the first match of the day! Representing Yoshihisa High: Team Burning Galaxies! Representing Kosasekai Academy: Team Multiversal!"

A male flavored robotic voice took the place of the announcer as the general chatter of the hall died down. "GUNPLA BATTLE, COMBAT MODE, STARTUP. MODEL DAMAGE LEVEL, SET TO B!"

"PLEASE SET YOUR GP BASE!"

As one, both teams slotted their identification devices into the system, their names and machines briefly appearing on the screens as they were registered.

"BEGINNING PLAVSKY PARTICLE DISPERSAL. FIELD ONE: SPACE!"

The lights across the venue dimmed as the systems booted to life, shining blue particles drifting up from the hexagonal panels as the selected map was generated. A vast asteroid field materialized across the space between the teams, the slowly drifting rocks presenting a constantly shifting variable for the battlefield.

"PLEASE SET YOUR GUNPLA!"

With the clicking of plastic feet each Fighter placed their Gunpla in the launch area in front of them, simulated hangers generating around each machine as they were scanned and infused with particles. Upon reaching full particle saturation each Gunpla lifted their heads, eyes flashing as they began to react to each test movement of the respective pilots' control spheres.

"BATTLE START!"

"Lelouch Lamperouge, Wing Zero Rebellion. Commencing operation!

"Bit Cloud, Barbatos Liger Rex! Let's do this!"

"Roger Smith, Age-1 Big O, Ye Not Guilty!"

The coach leaned back against the wall and grinned as his team began piloting circles around their unfortunate opponents, his own blond hair and beard hidden beneath the dimmed lights. Shots fired from beam weaponry reflected in his glasses before glancing straight at Meijin with an expression that just screamed "Watch out, these kids are going all the way to the top."

~MC~MC~MC~

Introducing Coach Chaos "The Terror of Luna 2", Coach of Team Multiversal. Personal Gunpla: Blood Moon Gundam

The Chaos of Earth 002036