Chapter 24: Villains Unmasked
Out in front of the Spica stadium, the duel between Jaden, Shizuma, and Nagisa had just ended. Shizuma was cradling an unconscious Nagisa in her arms. She had tried a few times to wake Nagisa up, but was unsuccessful. Tears were beginning to stream down the silver haired girl’s cheeks. Jaden felt terrible about what had happened. Just when Shizuma had finally moved on from her dead girlfriend, Kaori, the other girl that Shizuma was in love with was more or less taken from her by the power of a Wicked God. True Nagisa was only in a coma, but there was no telling if the redhead could recover. What was worse for Jaden was that he felt more or less responsible for what happened. Not only had he failed to find The Wicked Avatar before the catastrophe with Nagisa occurred, but it was his card that had finished Nagisa off.
Chikaru, Kizuna, Remon, Kagome, and the ghost of Lyman Banner had watched the duel from in front of the entryway to the stadium, but there was one other person who had been watching as well. Jaden and the others suddenly noticed Miyuki walking towards the distraught Shizuma. Apparently Miyuki had been watching the duel from a spot behind Jaden. Everyone had been too occupied with the duel to notice Miyuki’s arrival.
“I’m really sorry that things turned out this way Shizuma.” Miyuki said to the silver haired girls as she bent down and removed The Wicked Avatar card from Nagisa’s duel disk.
“Miyuki, what are you…?” Shizuma asked, finally noticing the arrival of her old friend. Jaden saw what Miyuki was doing.
“Miyuki put that card down!” Jaden called out. “You don’t know how dangerous it is!”
“I know exactly how powerful this card is Mr. Yuki.” Miyuki calmly replied. “After all, I’ve been searching for this card for awhile.”
“What’re you…?” Jaden began to ask, but he didn’t finish his question. He suddenly realized something about Miyuki, a suspicion that he had before. “Wait, you’re the one who’s been taking the Wicked God cards!”
Jaden’s accusation shocked everyone else, including Shizuma. Though Shizuma didn’t fully understand what was going on.
“You are correct Mr. Yuki.” Miyuki calmly replied with her usual stern expression.
“Why?” Jaden demanded. “What’re you planning to do with them?”
“I believe I can answer that question.” A voice suddenly answered. Everyone turned to see a man with long light-green hair and eyes in a buttoned up black trench coat and white pants standing in a spot to Jaden’s left. An old Kaiba Corp duel disk was on his left arm.
“Who are you?” Jaden asked the stranger. The green haired man ignored him. Miyuki walked up to the stranger and handed him The Wicked Avatar.
“Ah at long last, I once again have all three Wicked Gods.” The stranger said as he took the card from Miyuki.
“What on earth is going on out here?” a voice demanded. Everyone turned their attention to the entryway of the stadium and saw Pegasus standing there with the head mistress, along with Hikari, Amane, and Shion.
“Ah Master Pegasus, it’s been awhile.” The stranger said with a smirk.
“Gekko, is that you?” Pegasus asked in surprise. Jaden immediately remembered the name as the brother of the person who created the Wicked Gods, Yako Tenma.
“Oh Master Pegasus, I see that after all these years you still can’t tell my brother and I apart.” The green haired stranger commented in an amused tone.
“Yako?” Pegasus asked with a shocked expression. “Impossible! I would’ve been notified immediately if you had come out of your coma!”
It immediately dawned on Jaden that the stranger was indeed Yako Tenma, and that he was the one after the cards all along. Pegasus did have a point though; he would’ve been one of the first to know that Yako had recovered from the coma he had been sent into after that duel with his brother. So how was it that Pegasus didn’t know?
“I was never in a coma.” Tenma commented with a chuckle. “Gekko was the one who lost that duel with me all those years ago. My original plan was to flee right after I had beaten Gekko, but you arrived at the sight of our duel sooner than I expected. So I came up with a backup plan. Gekko and I were both wearing the same thing that day, so I switched our duel disks right before you entered the room. Frankly I’m not surprised that you thought that Gekko won. You always did see him as the better duelist.”
“Well if you’re really Yako, than why did you help with locking away the very cards that you created?” a confused Pegasus asked.
“For one thing, I had to keep up the charade.” Tenma replied. “After all, you expected my dear brother to help ‘clean up my mess.’ Besides, at the time I didn’t need the cards to carry out my plans. So I let you lock them away while I did more research on a few things, knowing that it would be a relatively easy task to retrieve the cards.”
“If it was so easy for you to get these wretched cards back, than why wait until now?” Chikaru asked, cutting into the conversation. “And more importantly, why is Miyuki helping you?”
“Ah, you ask a very good question Ms. Minamoto.” Tenma said to Chikaru. “To answer your question, let me remind you that I needed to research a couple of other things. You see creating the Wicked Gods was only the first step in my plans. The duel with my brother was merely a final test run to see how powerful the cards were. They passed that final test, so it came time for me to begin preparations for the next phase. You see I had created the Wicked Gods for two purposes. The first was to avenge Master Pegasus by defeating Yugi Muto. The second purpose of the Wicked Gods is the very reason why Ms. Rokujo has been helping me.”
“And just what is this second purpose Miyuki?” Chikaru demanded.
“To bring back Kaori!” Miyuki answered. That answer shocked everyone there except Tenma. Shizuma was especially shocked. She looked at Miyuki as if she had said something in a foreign language that she didn’t understand.
“Kaori? As in Kaori Sakuragi, Shizuma’s dead Etoile partner?” Chikaru asked in a confused tone. “But she’s dead! It’s impossible to bring her back!”
“Not with the power that Mr. Tenma has created.” Miyuki replied. “With it he can bring back those who have died.”
“And just how does this madman Tenma claim to do that?” Shion asked, joining in on the conversation.
“With my R.A. project!” Tenma answered. “R.A. is short for Rebirth of Avatar. It’s quite simple really. When a duelist creates their deck, they make it according to their likes and dislikes. The deck essentially becomes a refection of that duelist’s self, the duelist’s ‘soul’ if you will. All that needs to be done is to look over all the cards in the deck at once, and a picture of that soul is formed. With the R.A. project I can reproduce that soul from the deck and extract it, essentially brining that person back to life.
“I had designed this project with brining back Master Pegasus’ dearly departed wife in mind. At the moment however, I am uncertain how to do that, since she was never a duelist. Still I needed a test subject, and I was fortunate enough to find that Ms. Rokujo could provide me with one. When I had finished refining my theory for the R.A. project, it came time for me to locate and reclaim the Wicked God cards. It took some effort to find out that they were on Astraea Island, and once I did another small problem came up. After all, this isn’t exactly an island where I can walk around unnoticed. So I needed a scout, someone who could roam the island looking for the cards without arousing suspicion. That’s where your dear friend Miyuki comes in.
“In the beginning I had done some research on the students of all three academies, looking for someone who I could turn to my cause. In the course of my research I found out about the dead girl, Kaori Sakuragi, and about her dear friend, Shizuma Hanazono. It occurred to me that if those two girls were close, then Ms. Hanazono would do almost anything to bring the girl back. I came to the island in secret, and attempted to get in touch with Ms. Hanazono personally. Instead I ended up being intercepted by Ms. Rokujo. I was very fortunate though that she was a good friend of Ms. Hanazono, and that I was able to convince her to not have me thrown off the island.
“I showed Ms. Rokujo the video documentation of my work on the Wicked Gods. She did indeed comprehend their power. After that I explained the theory of my R.A. project. At first Ms. Rokujo was understandably skeptical, but when I reminded her of the power of the Wicked Gods, which she had more or less witnessed herself, she eventually took a leap of faith and agreed to help me. As it turned out Ms. Rokujo turned out to be more useful than I had ever imagined. The combat training that her father made her undergo when she was younger proved quite useful in retrieving the cards from their defeated wielders.”
Everyone who listened to Tenma’s tale about how he got Miyuki to help him was rather shocked, especially Shizuma. At that point Miyuki walked over to where Shizima was still holding onto the unconscious Nagisa and knelt down to face her.
“I know that it all sounds unbelievable Shizuma, and that some of the things that I’ve done might be wrong,” Miyuki said calmly to Shizuma, “but everything I’ve done has been for you. I’ve always had your best interests at heart, and I’ve been willing to do anything to see you happy again. I’m sorry about what happened to Ms. Aoi. I never expected this to happen, but I’m certain you’ll get over it in time. Once Mr. Tenma brings back Kaori…”
Miyuki’s sentence was cut off by a slap in the face from Shizuma, who glared at Miyuki with angry yet tear filled eyes.
“How dare you?” Shizuma asked angrily. “I love Nagisa! I love her perhaps as much as I loved Kaori! And you’re telling me to forget about her just because some psycho told you that he could bring Kaori back with some kind of weird dark magic? I’ve seen what those weird cards of his can do Miyuki and no good can come from them! I can’t believe that you’d put your faith in that madness! I’m not sure I even know you anymore!”
Miyuki stood back up and walked backwards away from Shizuma with a shocked expression on her face.
“Ah, it seems that your friend objects to using the R.A. project to resurrect her dead lover Ms. Rokujo.” Tenma said with a wry expression. “Oh well, I guess I’ll just have to find another guinea pig. Perhaps we can convince Ms. Hanazono to let us use the project to reconstruct Ms. Aoi’s shattered mind.”
“TENMA!” Jaden suddenly shouted after remaining silent for the whole conversation. As Jaden glared at Tenma, his eyes flashed to a bright gold for a moment before glowing in the orange and teal eyes of Yubel.
“Ah the infamous Jaden Yuki. I almost forgot about you.” Tenma said finally turning his attention to Jaden. “I have to thank you for helping me collect the Wicked Gods. I’m not sure that Ms. Rokujo would’ve been strong enough to defeat the wielders that the gods chose.”
“Those cards you created have caused nothing but pain and suffering Tenma!” Jaden angrily declared. “Almost everyone they’ve come in contact with has been hurt by them! Even your own brother! One way or another, I’m going to make you pay!”
“I see…” Tenma said with a wry expression as he shuffled the three Wicked God cards into his deck, along with one other card. “Than perhaps you’re willing to try and ‘make me pay’ by facing me in a duel. I still have one more thing to test out.”
“Game on!” Jaden said as he raised his duel disk arm.
