Chapter 2: - A Brand New Game
"Gramps! Serenity! Yugi! Yami! Ombre!"
Joey growled and looked around.
It had to be said that he had arrived in a place with a rather stunning view. From here he could see right down to the ocean, which seemed to stretch as far as the eye could see.
However, this wasn't a particularly helpful thing, since he had no idea where to start looking for anyone and his only route down was to climb down the canyon walls…
"Great, one of these days I'm going to think before I do something." He grumbled as he looked over the edge, contemplating his best route down… jumping wasn't a viable option. He hated heights with a passion and that hadn't helped. "At least my suitcase is in the real world…"
Something squawked behind him and he wheeled around just in time to dive under a swooping Whiptail Crow.
"Duel Monsters… but real…?" Joey automatically went for his deck as the huge bird wheeled around for a second attempt, "Why is nothing ever normal?" He snarled, rolling sideways and avoiding the attack, "Apparaître Red Eyes Black Dragon!" He bellowed, touching wand to deck.
Nothing happened.
"What?" Joey had time to yelp and then he was grabbed by the Whiptail Crow. "Put me down you feather duster!" He complained, "Put me down, put me down, put me down!" Then he looked down. "Wait, don't let me go!"
Of course the next thing Whiptail Crow did was drop him.
"Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!"
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Yami scowled as he looked around.
'Yugi?' He tried calling over the link, not particularly wanting to make to much noise in an unknown forest in some game that they didn't even know the rules to yet. Something told him that would be akin to having a sign over his head that flashed multiple colours and shouted 'I am here' to every enemy piece in the area.
Not something he particularly wanted to risk.
'Yugi, can you hear me?' Yami kicked a tree in frustration when he had no reply, wondering if Yugi was able to reply. They had to have ended up in the same region, they'd stepped on the same tile, but he had no idea just how big the region was, or whether Yugi had run into trouble already…
Stupid thought, of course Yugi had run into trouble already, if anything he was surprised he hadn't yet, the pair of them seemed to attract trouble. The only one they knew who was a bigger trouble magnet was their other link partner, Harry.
He carried on walking down the river, figuring it was the best course of action, and figuring that Yugi would figure to do the same, since it was the best bet of finding civilisation if you got lost in the wilderness… now who'd told him that…?
Yami shook his head and smiled slightly, it was probably Hermione or…
Yami stopped for a moment, sighing, and considering everything. It didn't seem right to him that Doctor Brisbane hadn't gone down into the game room and been dragged into the game. If he really had looked for their grandfather, then he should have looked everywhere, including that room.
"Yami?" The Pharaoh's head shot up at the sound of Yugi's mental voice and the sudden concern and worry that he could sense from his hikari.
'Yugi, where are you?'
"Uhhh…" Yami snorted at Yugi's reply, "I would recommend that you find some capsules."
'Capsules?' Yami asked. When Yugi sent him an image, he looked around to see if there were any nearby.
"Uh huh. It seems we've walked straight into a game of Capsule Monsters; you have to release the monsters from the capsules. I've picked up a Celtic Guardian." Yugi paused and Yami sensed the mental equivalent of Yugi biting his lower lip, "Be warned, what the monsters feel, we feel."
'So this is some kind of Shadow Game…'
"Uh huh."
'Great, just great…' Yami could sense Yugi's amusement at his irritation. 'It's not funny.'
"I know, I…" Yugi cut off suddenly and Yami sensed his sudden fear and shock.
'Yugi?'
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"Joey!"
"Yugi! Yami! Mr Muto!"
The two girls had no idea where they were, and there was no sign of the guys. This was not a good start.
"Where are we?" Serenity asked.
"I don't know." Ombre replied, scowling and pulling out her wand, "Point me, Solomon Muto."
Ombre knew what the spell was supposed to do; she'd helped Kari learn it for the last task of the Triwizard Tournament. It was supposed to spin around and stop in the direction of the person or thing that she'd told it to.
It was not supposed to waver in her hand and then lie flat and do nothing.
"Point me Muto Solomon." Ombre tried again, still nothing. "Point me Muto Yugi." Nothing, "Point me Wheeler Joseph." Nothing, "Point me Muto Yami…" Still nothing. "Why isn't that…?"
"We've been portkeyed into the middle of nowhere," Serenity pointed out, "Maybe magic doesn't work here."
"Or whoever keyed us here did something to us." Ombre growled, looking around and considering their options.
"So what do we do?" Serenity asked. "We need to find our brothers."
"And Solomon, if he's here." Ombre nodded, "I guess the only thing we can do is look. Yami and Yugi should be around here somewhere, they stepped on the same tile we did…"
"So shouldn't they be here?" Serenity asked.
"You'd have thought so, but then knowing Yugi he wandered off to find Joey and Mr Muto, and knowing Yami, he would have gone looking for Yugi…"
"So they could be anywhere…" Serenity sighed.
"I wouldn't worry, the guys are good at getting in and out of trouble and they're pretty good at finding each other. I got kidnapped last summer and taken to an island in the middle of nowhere and they still managed to find me, rescue Yugi and defeat the bad guy." Ombre tried to be reassuring.
"Do you guys ever get a normal summer?"
"What's normal?" Ombre snorted, wondering which way to go. She stilled as she heard something in the trees, looking over her right shoulder.
"Ombre?"
"Quiet a…" Ombre pulled Serenity aside as a Basic Insect leapt out at them from the trees and wheeled around, using her magic to push the bug away. "Talk later, run now."
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'Yugi?'
Yugi was already loading Celtic Guardian capsule into his launcher, trying to ignore Yami's voice in order to focus completely on the fact that two of the trees he'd been walking past had just turned into monsters.
"Launch Capsule!" Yugi ordered. His Celtic Guardian should be stronger then the trees, if he remembered correctly, so it was fine… Green light shot out, forming into his monster, which blocked the next branch's swipe at Yugi.
Celtic Guardian parried its next few blows in an attempt to protect Yugi.
'What's going on?'
"In battle a minute… argh…" Yugi cried out as Celtic Guardian got slammed by one of the branches.
'Yugi!'
Yugi didn't have time to answer as several other trees turned into Monsters. "There's too many!" Yugi yelped as he stood back to back with his monster. Celtic Guardian did its best but one of the branches wrapped around his leg, pulling him to the ground, and another wrapped around its neck.
Yugi started forward to help him, but the branch tightened around Celtic Guardian's neck, making it difficult for the Duel Monster to breathe.
And of course, what the Duel Monster felt, the Duellist felt.
Yugi froze; his hand going to his neck as if to pry away the branch, giving the tree monsters time to get a branch around Yugi's leg and drag him down.
"Celtic… Guardian…" Yugi croaked.
The Duel Monster tried to cry out, but the branch tightened even further, cutting of the protest midway through, branches from other trees wrapping around Celtic Guardian's arms and legs and trying to pull the warrior type monster limb from limb.
Yugi gave voice to the scream that Celtic Guardian couldn't let out.
"Hinotama Soul! Quickly!" A small fire shot past Yugi and slammed into the trees, which relinquished their grip on Yugi and Celtic Guardian as they burnt to a cinder.
"Celtic Guardian!" Yugi wheeled around to look at his Duel Monster, who accepted his hand up and then returned to his capsule.
"Are you alright?"
Yugi turned to look at his rescuer, "Thank you Yami."
"That's not an answer."
"I'm ok, thanks to you."
"You're sure?" Yami asked as he tried to calm down, Yugi's scream had terrified him.
"Yes." Yugi smiled reassuringly, "I'm sure. I'm fine now."
The word oops sprang to mind as Yami gave him an odd look.
"We seriously need to get over this aversion to the word 'fine'." Yugi sighed at him.
Yami returned his monster to its capsule. "It doesn't help that you use it even when you're not fine, Yugi. Harry does exactly the same thing."
"So do you!" Yugi pointed out.
Yami grumbled something that Yugi didn't catch, but the hikari let it slide in favour of looking around. "We need to find Grandpa and the others before something happens to them."
"I know."
"Plus side." Yugi said brightly, "We have our packs. That means we have first aid kits, emergency supplies…"
"You were predicting trouble too?"
"Yami this is us, when don't we run into trouble of some kind? I'd like to remind you that Hogwarts is supposed to be the safest place in Britain and yet…"
"I really think that claim is over rated." Yami scowled, "Unless there's someone deliberately letting the bad guys past the defences."
"Dumbledore." Yugi sighed.
"Why do we go back there again?"
"Because I can't afford a tutor?"
"Most of what wand magic can do, shadow magic can do better."
"Because we have family there?"
"Point." Yami sighed.
"Besides, it's not so bad, at least we don't get chased around by fangirls at Hogwarts."
Yami face palmed.
Yugi laughed, recognising that he'd managed to distract Yami enough to let him calm down. "Come on, let's find the others."
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Joey was hiding in a cave behind a waterfall, his new friend, a Baby Dragon that he'd released from a capsule looking thing, having just escaped from a flock of Whiptail Crows.
"Man," Joey ran a hand through his hair, "That was a close one, hey pal?"
Baby Dragon gave him a questioning look, tilting its head and giving its best impression of a roar. Joey grinned at it. "I missed having the real monsters around…" He murmured, turning to look around.
The Duel Monsters had decided to head home for a while, taking whatever routes they took back to the Monster World the day after the funeral and planning on returning the sometime during the week that they returned from India.
Except they weren't in India… well they were, but he didn't really think this game world counted.
Joey tried to hide his irritation about their interrupted vacation from his dragon as he cautiously walked towards the chest that was in the centre of the room.
Not that he didn't want the treasure inside but too many years of experience with magic had taught him that you couldn't take much at face value.
"So what do you think is inside?" He asked the Dragon, though he was more thinking out loud then really asking for the Wind attribute monster's opinion.
Joey flipped the lid on the red and gold treasure chest, the eye symbol on the catch reminded him of the eye on the Millennium Puzzle, making him more then a little nervous as whatever was inside started to glow.
Something shot out of the chest, wrapping itself tightly around Joey and squeezing tightly. "Baby Dragon…"
The dragon, who was still one of Joey's favourite monsters, didn't need anymore prompting, though Joey quickly wished it had, as he incinerated the scroll with his fire breath, causing Joey to dive underneath the spray… "Hot! Hot! Hot!"
The chest glowed a second time, causing Joey to prepare to duck this time, however this time the light solidified into a piece of papyrus which had some kind of markings on… Joey examined it carefully.
He didn't recognise most of the writing though, from the few symbols he did, he could guess that Yugi or Yami would be able to, but if he was right about the layout of the images on it, this was a map of the game world…
He headed outside, Baby Dragon in tow, to see if his theory was correct.
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To say Seto Kaiba was ill amused would be a lie.
To say that he was completely and utterly pissed off would come much closer to the truth, but would still be an understatement, but it was only Mokuba would could see just how angry he was as successfully controlled his temper in order to deal with the investigators from the Japanese Ministry.
He'd had a call to his office, from the Indian Ministry, telling him that his guests had not arrived at the pre arranged time and place, and if they weren't coming, he could have been so kind as to tell them as they had much more important things to be doing.
Since Seto had seen them take the portkey and leave, he had immediately informed them that had to have been an error with the portkey and perhaps they would be better off looking for the missing people.
Of course, not trusting another country's government after the way the American Ministry had acted and the corruption that was racing through the English one, he called in both his own people and the Japanese Ministry.
Unfortunately the 'Aurors' that had shown up, had decided that he had tampered with the portkey in some way and had just wasted six hours trying to prove this fact and now it had been disproved, were claiming that the incident had happened outside of their realm of influence.
Perhaps it wasn't a foreign thing; perhaps it was just that all Ministries were this incompetent…
Fortunately for the Aurors that had been wasting so much time, the Japanese equivalent of an 'Unspeakable' was called in to trace the portkey's magic using a blue sphere of some kind, and was now following it to see where the trail went.
This, to Seto, was progress, but not fast enough. He knew his brothers all too well, if there was danger or a way to get into trouble, or if the world needed saving, there would be some way that they would accidently stumble right into the middle of it…
Pre-Hogwarts he would have considered telling them to stop saving the world and get a hobby, but since every time Yugi and Yami tried to play their hobby another lunatic tried to take over the world, Seto had wondered more then once if they would be safer locked away from the world for the rest of eternity.
Except then they'd have gotten bored and bored was worse then trouble for this pair, since bored inevitably equal 'practising magic' which if they weren't careful often equalled property destruction (Seto was thinking of Boh and the train, or the Battle Royale at the end of term, though technically that hadn't been Yugi and Yami's fault, but was a great example of what happened if you locked the 'twins' away).
His brothers and sisters were missing… one reason to be irritated.
He'd been falsely accused of trying to make them vanish…. another one.
It was likely that they'd gotten into trouble or had been kidnapped for some reason… another one.
Seto had many reasons for working up into the ire he was currently feeling and it wasn't helped when two hours later, he was informed that the portkey's magic had run out in a clearing in the middle of nowhere and did he recognise this?
Of course Seto recognised it. How could he not?
The Auror was holding up Yami's Dark Magician card.
There was more then one Dark Magician in the world, there was even more then one type of Dark Magician using the same name, the red one, the blue one and the purple one, but he knew that card, had seen it in battle so many times, had faced it down almost as many…
It was Yami's…
And Yami would never have left it behind willingly…
So where were his family?
Mokuba slipped out of the room as Seto started organising a search party. He had phone calls to make. If family members were going missing again, Mokuba needed to spread the word, not let everyone hear about it later.
He looked through his list of phone numbers on his mobile. He'd promised Rebecca, Luna and Ginny that he'd keep them up to date if trouble hit, Hermione would deck him if he didn't inform her, Ron he could tell at the same time as Ginny… Mokuba was glad his brother had thought of the phones, making it easy to reach the entire family if it was needed, without waiting weeks for a reply, like you had to with letters.
The first thing his big brother had done, after Seto had put down the phone to the Indian Ministry, was attempt to ring Yugi… well… he'd tried all their numbers, but the only message he'd gotten was 'I'm sorry, but this person's phone is currently switched off', which had only added to Seto's irritability.
Mokuba picked the first number he came across, waiting as the phone rang and then speaking in clear, slightly accented English, "Hello Hermione…"
"Mokuba?" Hermione sounded shocked, he wasn't surprised, considering that she and Mokuba were family, yes, but they hadn't really spoken one to one, "Alright spill it, what's happened? I thought this was the day everyone went to India."
Mokuba sighed; trust Hermione, "It is, but there's been a problem…"
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Of all the monsters they could have ended up with to fight this Grasschopper, Gigantes and Mystical Elf were not anywhere near the list of preferred ones. They weren't even honourable mention, though to be fair to Serenity's elf, if she hadn't healed Ombre's rock warrior, Ombre would have been down one monster already.
And unlike earlier, when they hadn't even considered picking up monsters, there were no capsules in sight.
Ombre pulled Joey's little sister behind her. She'd failed one young woman; she wouldn't fail to protect another, "Gigantes, attack!"
"Ombre, no!"
"ALRIGHT, SUMMONED SKULL. LIGHTENING STRIKE!" Someone roared and seconds later lightening struck causing the huge mantis like creature to scream and then explode.
Ombre wheeled around as the huge Fiend type stood in front of them, considering them for a moment, before looking away as if listening to a voice only it could hear, possibly that of its master and vanished in a ball of light.
"Who was…" Serenity started.
"Serenity, Ombre, what are you doing here?" Solomon asked, pushing his way through the bushes to their left and staring at them as if they were aliens. "You're supposed to be on holiday."
"Mr Muto?" Ombre looked just as shocked, though she'd known he was in the game somewhere, "That was your Summoned Skull?"
"How many times do I have to tell you, 'it's okay to call me Grandpa', before it sink's in?" Solomon sighed, "And yes, that was my fiend, are you girls alright?"
"We're okay." Serenity nodded, as the girls recalled their monsters, "But the boys are missing."
"Let me guess, Yugi, Yami and Joey are with you?"
"That's right." Ombre nodded. "We got split up."
The three of them paused as they heard the sound of heavy breathing, turning to look down the path as Yami and Yugi paused as they caught sight of them, then before anyone saw Yugi move, he'd glomped his Grandfather, causing Solomon to groan, Yugi wasn't as small as he'd once been and he'd grown taller then his Grandfather, not that that could be considered hard.
"You're safe!" Yugi sounded so relieved that Ombre smiled slightly, "Don't ever scare me like that again."
Solomon chuckled as Yugi let go, looking at his second Grandson.
"I'm pleased to see you are safe and well." Yami smiled.
That was enough for Solomon. He knew Yami wasn't one for overly emotional displays and that natural smile was more then a lot of people got out of the Pharaoh.
"Have you found Joey yet?" Serenity asked, looking down when she saw Yugi's shoulders sink and Yami shake his head.
"We'll find him." Yami sounded confident, "Joey's tough, he'll be fine until we meet up with him."
"How did you lot get here?" Solomon demanded.
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Harry had known something was wrong the moment that his, strained as it was, link to Yami and Yugi had gone completely. The phone call had only confirmed this.
"We wouldn't be any help Harry." Sirius tried to reason with his Godson, who had been acting irritable for the last few hours, needing an explanation for the sudden loss of the currently tenuous link that connected him to the Muto 'twins', but unable to reach anyone's phones.
He knew what day it was. Today was the day that they'd been due to go on holiday to India, which meant that the Game Shop was empty so he couldn't call there and he had already tried their mobile numbers, which he had gotten off of Yugi a couple of days ago luckily, and all of them had been switched off.
"We have to do something, Sirius; they're my brothers and sisters!" Harry protested, though he knew that the adults would consider an underage wizard to be little help in the search, never mind the mind link that bound Harry, Yugi and Yami together, after Yami had helped his mind recover from the stress of the Shadow Realm… no… he'd be considered a pest and kept away from the area.
"Kaiba's already got people looking, they'll find them Harry."
"But it's Yugi and Yami! They could be neck deep in trouble by now! You know what Mokuba said! Yami left behind his Dark Magician! Yami never leaves his Dark Magician anywhere!"
"Maybe he dropped it, he could be perfectly fine for all you know, the link isn't perfect this far away. You've had it vanish intermittently for days now…"
"It's been getting better since we've been heading east." Harry scowled, remembering the moments that the link, which had been playing up with Yugi and Yami in Japan and Harry in France, had vanished, nearly scaring Harry half to death since he knew what that could possibly mean, and causing some rather odd phone calls at rather odd times of the day until they'd left France and started travelling East, stopping at Tournaments on the way… Harry blamed Sirius… when it had at least become stable, though talking or sensing emotions was still impossible.
It was enough for Harry that he could sense that they were alright.
And several hours ago, that feeling had vanished.
"It's Monday today, give it a week, Harry. If the link's not back or Yugi hasn't phoned you by Sunday, we'll go, alright?"
Harry shook his head. "Tomorrow."
"Saturday."
"Tuesday."
"Friday."
"Wednesday."
"Thursday." Sirius offered, knowing just how worried his Godson was, but not understanding how they could be any more useful then fully trained search patrols.
"Wednesday night." Harry offered back, feeling bad for badgering, but needing to know his family were alright.
"Deal." Sirius agreed. "If Yugi hasn't phoned by seven pm on Wednesday, English time, mind." He added, "We'll head to Japan."
"Alright." Harry nodded, unhappy and not really willing to wait that long, he would though, for Sirius.
"Shall we get ready to go out then?" Sirius asked, amused when Harry sorted out his bandana, which covered his scar and was a present from Duke Devlin, though the dog animagus wished it was any colour other then green.
Harry nodded. Three days… he would wait three days…
Sirius hadn't made him agree not to phone…
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Night had fallen in the game and they'd gathered around a camp fire in order to cook some of the food that Yugi had had the foresight to pack. What Yugi hadn't packed in his bag, which he'd put the extension charm on so he could get more stuff in it, Solomon had in his pack, so the meal was in fact quite reasonable.
But it didn't put anyone's mind at rest. Joey was still out there, lost in the wilderness and alone and… Yugi's head came to rest on his knees, not hungry in the slightest at the thought that Joey could be out there somewhere, hungry and injured, while they were enjoying their meal.
'You need to eat, hikari,' Yami sent, trying not to worry the others any further then they already were, 'You'll be no good tomorrow if you let yourself wear down and don't eat.'
"But Joey…"
'Joey's capable of looking after himself and has his own supplies, or don't you believe what you told Serenity earlier?' Yami asked. 'That Joey would be fine and would probably meet us coming around the next corner?'
Yugi sent him the equivalent of a glare, not overly happy with Yami quoting his own words back at him. He heard Yami give a soft, amused snort, but didn't answer his question. It was easy to be strong for other people while they were on the move, they had to do it all the time, but when they stopped, the fear gnawed away at him, and he knew Yami knew it.
It didn't help that he could sense Yami was worried too, and was just better at faking that he wasn't, then Yugi.
"I just had a thought." Ombre snorted, looking at Yami and Yugi, who both blinked and looked at her simultaneously. "Harry's got to be freaking out right about now."
"Harry doesn't freak out. He just gets… concerned."
Ombre looked partially amused, "He's going to be freaking out and if you don't ring him the moment that we get out of this game, he'll probably bring the whole family to find us."
"Hermione." Yugi face palmed, "She's going to kill me."
"What?"
"Hermione doesn't kill people."
"She will," Yugi responded, shaking his head, "She made me promise to phone at the first sign of weirdness."
"In your defence the phones weren't working."
"She might let me live then…" Yugi considered it.
"Seto won't worry." Ombre said.
"Seto probably already has a search party out looking for us." Yami chuckled, "I don't want to win the title because my rivals are missing, now find them or I'll get all of you fired!"
He said the latter while doing an impression of Seto, which was even funnier when, in the same tone of voice, he yelped, moving back a couple of foot, because Joey had fallen from the sky and had been caught by a Baby Dragon, his face stopping just inches from Yami's.
"Uh… hi."
"Joey!" Yugi and Serenity grinned at the same time, as Baby Dragon set Joey down and returned to his capsule.
In a heartbeat Joey had his sister clinging to him, telling him never to do that again, and if he scared her like that again she was going to do something drastic. Once she'd calmed down, Joey smiled at Yugi and Yami. "You alright bros?"
"We're good, better now you're back with the group." Yami nodded as Yugi hugged his friend.
Joey looked over Yugi's head to his grandfather, "You ok, Gramps?"
"I'm fine." Solomon nodded, amused as Yugi sat back down and proceeded to eat his food hastily.
"Ombre?" Joey asked, with a nod.
"I'm ok." Ombre nodded back.
"You got any of that grub left?" Joey asked. "I'm starved."
"I thought you said you had food." Yami frowned.
"Chocolate bars." Joey scowled.
"Huh?" Everyone but Yugi looked confused. The hikari however, who had luckily just swallowed a mouthful, started laughing.
"It's not funny Yugi!" Joey protested.
"What's so funny?"
"Mai… food… cooked… chocolate bars!" Yugi gasped between giggles. "Duellist Kingdom."
"Give me a break!" Joey complained, "I was still learning!"
"Be nice Yugi or I will give Joey your second helpings." Solomon scolded.
"Sorry." Yugi gasped, trying to calm down.
"We were just discussing who's going to be freaking out the most." Yami advised, trying not to look too amused at his hikari's state.
"That's easy," Joey said as Solomon dished him up a helping, "In order, Harry, Hermione, Seto, Mokuba… Ron won't freak, because he only ever seems to freak out about the wrong things."
"Don't be mean." Yugi scolded.
"I'm not being mean, I'm being honest." Joey protested.
"He has a point. If he's going to freak out about any part of this whole situation, it's going to be because we didn't bring him along." Yami frowned.
There was silence for a moment as Yugi found he couldn't deny this and Ombre frowned as she considered their surroundings. "Hey guys, is it me, or did those flowers move closer?"
The others looked around.
Joey scrambled to his feet, "Uh oh."
"I hate uh oh." Yugi groaned as he got to his own, already reaching for his capsule, recognising that Ombre was right, "It's right up there with fine and oops."
"I thought you said that we had to get over our aversion to 'fine'." Yami prodded, wondering just how much help his Hinotama Soul was going to be.
"Are you going to be quoting things back at me all the way through this game?" Yugi asked irritably.
"Game?" Joey asked.
"This is a Shadow Game, isn't it?" Ombre scowled at Yugi and Yami. They nodded, "I knew it when I felt the injuries my monster sustained."
"A Shadow Game!" Joey yelped, "But that would mean the only way out is to win."
"J…Joey?" Serenity asked, backing up against him as the flowers grew nearer, growling.
"Talk later." Yami advised, "Load capsule!"
Simultaneously, the five younger ones loaded their monsters, launching their capsules at the same time, as Solomon picked up a flaming stick and threw it into the flowers.
Their shadows revealed what they were.
"Flower Wolves!" Yami hissed, scowling as Solomon realised that his capsule was still unusable and an odd shade of silver and picked up another blazing stick as the wolves launched their attack.
"Celtic Guardian!" Yugi yelled, throwing his arm forward, "Attack!" Celtic Guardian's sword cut through the two that had launched themselves at him.
"Baby Dragon! Show us what you can do!" Joey called, pride in his voice as the little orange dragon leapt forward, slamming the Flower Wolves with its tail. One Flower Wolf dodged around the swinging tail and bit into the dragon's side.
Joey cried out, clutching his side.
"Hinotama Soul, help him!" Yami ordered.
The floating fire ball shot forward, setting the wolf's flowers alight. It barked and let go, but a second one slammed into it, singeing its fur but sending it crashing into the ground.
Yami groaned and sunk to his knees.
"Yami!" Serenity's Mystical Elf lured a group away and Yugi was about to help her when his Celtic Guardian was assaulted by a group of Flower Wolves who bit the monster's shoulder and side.
Yugi cried out and Yami struggled to his feet to try to work out a way to help both, settling for grabbing a flaming stick and attacking the wolves attacking Celtic Guardian as Hinotama Soul burnt one of the ones attacking Baby Dragon.
Yami's eyes widened as his Grandpa attempted to fight the wolves off with one of the pieces of lit wood, only to be saved by Ombre's Gigantes, the only monster they had with more attack points then these wolves.
"We need a plan." Yami growled, before dodging a pair of Flower Wolves and falling backwards, having tripped over a stone at his feet. Hinotama Soul burnt one wolf and the other was sliced in two by the monster that had appeared when Yami had hit a capsule that had been mostly buried in the ground. "King's Knight…" Yami murmured. The monster leapt forward, slicing more wolves in two.
"There's too many!" Joey yelled.
"We just need to blind them long enough to get away…" Yugi thought quickly, "Cover your eyes!"
"What?" Joey yelped.
Yami sensed Yugi gather his magic, "Do it!" Yami snapped, already closing his.
The others followed suit just in time as Yugi sent out a wave of light that knocked back all the wolves and by the time that it had faded, the humans had gone, leaving only the campfire and the bags behind.
Joey growled and looked around.
It had to be said that he had arrived in a place with a rather stunning view. From here he could see right down to the ocean, which seemed to stretch as far as the eye could see.
However, this wasn't a particularly helpful thing, since he had no idea where to start looking for anyone and his only route down was to climb down the canyon walls…
"Great, one of these days I'm going to think before I do something." He grumbled as he looked over the edge, contemplating his best route down… jumping wasn't a viable option. He hated heights with a passion and that hadn't helped. "At least my suitcase is in the real world…"
Something squawked behind him and he wheeled around just in time to dive under a swooping Whiptail Crow.
"Duel Monsters… but real…?" Joey automatically went for his deck as the huge bird wheeled around for a second attempt, "Why is nothing ever normal?" He snarled, rolling sideways and avoiding the attack, "Apparaître Red Eyes Black Dragon!" He bellowed, touching wand to deck.
Nothing happened.
"What?" Joey had time to yelp and then he was grabbed by the Whiptail Crow. "Put me down you feather duster!" He complained, "Put me down, put me down, put me down!" Then he looked down. "Wait, don't let me go!"
Of course the next thing Whiptail Crow did was drop him.
"Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!"
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Yami scowled as he looked around.
'Yugi?' He tried calling over the link, not particularly wanting to make to much noise in an unknown forest in some game that they didn't even know the rules to yet. Something told him that would be akin to having a sign over his head that flashed multiple colours and shouted 'I am here' to every enemy piece in the area.
Not something he particularly wanted to risk.
'Yugi, can you hear me?' Yami kicked a tree in frustration when he had no reply, wondering if Yugi was able to reply. They had to have ended up in the same region, they'd stepped on the same tile, but he had no idea just how big the region was, or whether Yugi had run into trouble already…
Stupid thought, of course Yugi had run into trouble already, if anything he was surprised he hadn't yet, the pair of them seemed to attract trouble. The only one they knew who was a bigger trouble magnet was their other link partner, Harry.
He carried on walking down the river, figuring it was the best course of action, and figuring that Yugi would figure to do the same, since it was the best bet of finding civilisation if you got lost in the wilderness… now who'd told him that…?
Yami shook his head and smiled slightly, it was probably Hermione or…
Yami stopped for a moment, sighing, and considering everything. It didn't seem right to him that Doctor Brisbane hadn't gone down into the game room and been dragged into the game. If he really had looked for their grandfather, then he should have looked everywhere, including that room.
"Yami?" The Pharaoh's head shot up at the sound of Yugi's mental voice and the sudden concern and worry that he could sense from his hikari.
'Yugi, where are you?'
"Uhhh…" Yami snorted at Yugi's reply, "I would recommend that you find some capsules."
'Capsules?' Yami asked. When Yugi sent him an image, he looked around to see if there were any nearby.
"Uh huh. It seems we've walked straight into a game of Capsule Monsters; you have to release the monsters from the capsules. I've picked up a Celtic Guardian." Yugi paused and Yami sensed the mental equivalent of Yugi biting his lower lip, "Be warned, what the monsters feel, we feel."
'So this is some kind of Shadow Game…'
"Uh huh."
'Great, just great…' Yami could sense Yugi's amusement at his irritation. 'It's not funny.'
"I know, I…" Yugi cut off suddenly and Yami sensed his sudden fear and shock.
'Yugi?'
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"Joey!"
"Yugi! Yami! Mr Muto!"
The two girls had no idea where they were, and there was no sign of the guys. This was not a good start.
"Where are we?" Serenity asked.
"I don't know." Ombre replied, scowling and pulling out her wand, "Point me, Solomon Muto."
Ombre knew what the spell was supposed to do; she'd helped Kari learn it for the last task of the Triwizard Tournament. It was supposed to spin around and stop in the direction of the person or thing that she'd told it to.
It was not supposed to waver in her hand and then lie flat and do nothing.
"Point me Muto Solomon." Ombre tried again, still nothing. "Point me Muto Yugi." Nothing, "Point me Wheeler Joseph." Nothing, "Point me Muto Yami…" Still nothing. "Why isn't that…?"
"We've been portkeyed into the middle of nowhere," Serenity pointed out, "Maybe magic doesn't work here."
"Or whoever keyed us here did something to us." Ombre growled, looking around and considering their options.
"So what do we do?" Serenity asked. "We need to find our brothers."
"And Solomon, if he's here." Ombre nodded, "I guess the only thing we can do is look. Yami and Yugi should be around here somewhere, they stepped on the same tile we did…"
"So shouldn't they be here?" Serenity asked.
"You'd have thought so, but then knowing Yugi he wandered off to find Joey and Mr Muto, and knowing Yami, he would have gone looking for Yugi…"
"So they could be anywhere…" Serenity sighed.
"I wouldn't worry, the guys are good at getting in and out of trouble and they're pretty good at finding each other. I got kidnapped last summer and taken to an island in the middle of nowhere and they still managed to find me, rescue Yugi and defeat the bad guy." Ombre tried to be reassuring.
"Do you guys ever get a normal summer?"
"What's normal?" Ombre snorted, wondering which way to go. She stilled as she heard something in the trees, looking over her right shoulder.
"Ombre?"
"Quiet a…" Ombre pulled Serenity aside as a Basic Insect leapt out at them from the trees and wheeled around, using her magic to push the bug away. "Talk later, run now."
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'Yugi?'
Yugi was already loading Celtic Guardian capsule into his launcher, trying to ignore Yami's voice in order to focus completely on the fact that two of the trees he'd been walking past had just turned into monsters.
"Launch Capsule!" Yugi ordered. His Celtic Guardian should be stronger then the trees, if he remembered correctly, so it was fine… Green light shot out, forming into his monster, which blocked the next branch's swipe at Yugi.
Celtic Guardian parried its next few blows in an attempt to protect Yugi.
'What's going on?'
"In battle a minute… argh…" Yugi cried out as Celtic Guardian got slammed by one of the branches.
'Yugi!'
Yugi didn't have time to answer as several other trees turned into Monsters. "There's too many!" Yugi yelped as he stood back to back with his monster. Celtic Guardian did its best but one of the branches wrapped around his leg, pulling him to the ground, and another wrapped around its neck.
Yugi started forward to help him, but the branch tightened around Celtic Guardian's neck, making it difficult for the Duel Monster to breathe.
And of course, what the Duel Monster felt, the Duellist felt.
Yugi froze; his hand going to his neck as if to pry away the branch, giving the tree monsters time to get a branch around Yugi's leg and drag him down.
"Celtic… Guardian…" Yugi croaked.
The Duel Monster tried to cry out, but the branch tightened even further, cutting of the protest midway through, branches from other trees wrapping around Celtic Guardian's arms and legs and trying to pull the warrior type monster limb from limb.
Yugi gave voice to the scream that Celtic Guardian couldn't let out.
"Hinotama Soul! Quickly!" A small fire shot past Yugi and slammed into the trees, which relinquished their grip on Yugi and Celtic Guardian as they burnt to a cinder.
"Celtic Guardian!" Yugi wheeled around to look at his Duel Monster, who accepted his hand up and then returned to his capsule.
"Are you alright?"
Yugi turned to look at his rescuer, "Thank you Yami."
"That's not an answer."
"I'm ok, thanks to you."
"You're sure?" Yami asked as he tried to calm down, Yugi's scream had terrified him.
"Yes." Yugi smiled reassuringly, "I'm sure. I'm fine now."
The word oops sprang to mind as Yami gave him an odd look.
"We seriously need to get over this aversion to the word 'fine'." Yugi sighed at him.
Yami returned his monster to its capsule. "It doesn't help that you use it even when you're not fine, Yugi. Harry does exactly the same thing."
"So do you!" Yugi pointed out.
Yami grumbled something that Yugi didn't catch, but the hikari let it slide in favour of looking around. "We need to find Grandpa and the others before something happens to them."
"I know."
"Plus side." Yugi said brightly, "We have our packs. That means we have first aid kits, emergency supplies…"
"You were predicting trouble too?"
"Yami this is us, when don't we run into trouble of some kind? I'd like to remind you that Hogwarts is supposed to be the safest place in Britain and yet…"
"I really think that claim is over rated." Yami scowled, "Unless there's someone deliberately letting the bad guys past the defences."
"Dumbledore." Yugi sighed.
"Why do we go back there again?"
"Because I can't afford a tutor?"
"Most of what wand magic can do, shadow magic can do better."
"Because we have family there?"
"Point." Yami sighed.
"Besides, it's not so bad, at least we don't get chased around by fangirls at Hogwarts."
Yami face palmed.
Yugi laughed, recognising that he'd managed to distract Yami enough to let him calm down. "Come on, let's find the others."
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Joey was hiding in a cave behind a waterfall, his new friend, a Baby Dragon that he'd released from a capsule looking thing, having just escaped from a flock of Whiptail Crows.
"Man," Joey ran a hand through his hair, "That was a close one, hey pal?"
Baby Dragon gave him a questioning look, tilting its head and giving its best impression of a roar. Joey grinned at it. "I missed having the real monsters around…" He murmured, turning to look around.
The Duel Monsters had decided to head home for a while, taking whatever routes they took back to the Monster World the day after the funeral and planning on returning the sometime during the week that they returned from India.
Except they weren't in India… well they were, but he didn't really think this game world counted.
Joey tried to hide his irritation about their interrupted vacation from his dragon as he cautiously walked towards the chest that was in the centre of the room.
Not that he didn't want the treasure inside but too many years of experience with magic had taught him that you couldn't take much at face value.
"So what do you think is inside?" He asked the Dragon, though he was more thinking out loud then really asking for the Wind attribute monster's opinion.
Joey flipped the lid on the red and gold treasure chest, the eye symbol on the catch reminded him of the eye on the Millennium Puzzle, making him more then a little nervous as whatever was inside started to glow.
Something shot out of the chest, wrapping itself tightly around Joey and squeezing tightly. "Baby Dragon…"
The dragon, who was still one of Joey's favourite monsters, didn't need anymore prompting, though Joey quickly wished it had, as he incinerated the scroll with his fire breath, causing Joey to dive underneath the spray… "Hot! Hot! Hot!"
The chest glowed a second time, causing Joey to prepare to duck this time, however this time the light solidified into a piece of papyrus which had some kind of markings on… Joey examined it carefully.
He didn't recognise most of the writing though, from the few symbols he did, he could guess that Yugi or Yami would be able to, but if he was right about the layout of the images on it, this was a map of the game world…
He headed outside, Baby Dragon in tow, to see if his theory was correct.
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To say Seto Kaiba was ill amused would be a lie.
To say that he was completely and utterly pissed off would come much closer to the truth, but would still be an understatement, but it was only Mokuba would could see just how angry he was as successfully controlled his temper in order to deal with the investigators from the Japanese Ministry.
He'd had a call to his office, from the Indian Ministry, telling him that his guests had not arrived at the pre arranged time and place, and if they weren't coming, he could have been so kind as to tell them as they had much more important things to be doing.
Since Seto had seen them take the portkey and leave, he had immediately informed them that had to have been an error with the portkey and perhaps they would be better off looking for the missing people.
Of course, not trusting another country's government after the way the American Ministry had acted and the corruption that was racing through the English one, he called in both his own people and the Japanese Ministry.
Unfortunately the 'Aurors' that had shown up, had decided that he had tampered with the portkey in some way and had just wasted six hours trying to prove this fact and now it had been disproved, were claiming that the incident had happened outside of their realm of influence.
Perhaps it wasn't a foreign thing; perhaps it was just that all Ministries were this incompetent…
Fortunately for the Aurors that had been wasting so much time, the Japanese equivalent of an 'Unspeakable' was called in to trace the portkey's magic using a blue sphere of some kind, and was now following it to see where the trail went.
This, to Seto, was progress, but not fast enough. He knew his brothers all too well, if there was danger or a way to get into trouble, or if the world needed saving, there would be some way that they would accidently stumble right into the middle of it…
Pre-Hogwarts he would have considered telling them to stop saving the world and get a hobby, but since every time Yugi and Yami tried to play their hobby another lunatic tried to take over the world, Seto had wondered more then once if they would be safer locked away from the world for the rest of eternity.
Except then they'd have gotten bored and bored was worse then trouble for this pair, since bored inevitably equal 'practising magic' which if they weren't careful often equalled property destruction (Seto was thinking of Boh and the train, or the Battle Royale at the end of term, though technically that hadn't been Yugi and Yami's fault, but was a great example of what happened if you locked the 'twins' away).
His brothers and sisters were missing… one reason to be irritated.
He'd been falsely accused of trying to make them vanish…. another one.
It was likely that they'd gotten into trouble or had been kidnapped for some reason… another one.
Seto had many reasons for working up into the ire he was currently feeling and it wasn't helped when two hours later, he was informed that the portkey's magic had run out in a clearing in the middle of nowhere and did he recognise this?
Of course Seto recognised it. How could he not?
The Auror was holding up Yami's Dark Magician card.
There was more then one Dark Magician in the world, there was even more then one type of Dark Magician using the same name, the red one, the blue one and the purple one, but he knew that card, had seen it in battle so many times, had faced it down almost as many…
It was Yami's…
And Yami would never have left it behind willingly…
So where were his family?
Mokuba slipped out of the room as Seto started organising a search party. He had phone calls to make. If family members were going missing again, Mokuba needed to spread the word, not let everyone hear about it later.
He looked through his list of phone numbers on his mobile. He'd promised Rebecca, Luna and Ginny that he'd keep them up to date if trouble hit, Hermione would deck him if he didn't inform her, Ron he could tell at the same time as Ginny… Mokuba was glad his brother had thought of the phones, making it easy to reach the entire family if it was needed, without waiting weeks for a reply, like you had to with letters.
The first thing his big brother had done, after Seto had put down the phone to the Indian Ministry, was attempt to ring Yugi… well… he'd tried all their numbers, but the only message he'd gotten was 'I'm sorry, but this person's phone is currently switched off', which had only added to Seto's irritability.
Mokuba picked the first number he came across, waiting as the phone rang and then speaking in clear, slightly accented English, "Hello Hermione…"
"Mokuba?" Hermione sounded shocked, he wasn't surprised, considering that she and Mokuba were family, yes, but they hadn't really spoken one to one, "Alright spill it, what's happened? I thought this was the day everyone went to India."
Mokuba sighed; trust Hermione, "It is, but there's been a problem…"
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Of all the monsters they could have ended up with to fight this Grasschopper, Gigantes and Mystical Elf were not anywhere near the list of preferred ones. They weren't even honourable mention, though to be fair to Serenity's elf, if she hadn't healed Ombre's rock warrior, Ombre would have been down one monster already.
And unlike earlier, when they hadn't even considered picking up monsters, there were no capsules in sight.
Ombre pulled Joey's little sister behind her. She'd failed one young woman; she wouldn't fail to protect another, "Gigantes, attack!"
"Ombre, no!"
"ALRIGHT, SUMMONED SKULL. LIGHTENING STRIKE!" Someone roared and seconds later lightening struck causing the huge mantis like creature to scream and then explode.
Ombre wheeled around as the huge Fiend type stood in front of them, considering them for a moment, before looking away as if listening to a voice only it could hear, possibly that of its master and vanished in a ball of light.
"Who was…" Serenity started.
"Serenity, Ombre, what are you doing here?" Solomon asked, pushing his way through the bushes to their left and staring at them as if they were aliens. "You're supposed to be on holiday."
"Mr Muto?" Ombre looked just as shocked, though she'd known he was in the game somewhere, "That was your Summoned Skull?"
"How many times do I have to tell you, 'it's okay to call me Grandpa', before it sink's in?" Solomon sighed, "And yes, that was my fiend, are you girls alright?"
"We're okay." Serenity nodded, as the girls recalled their monsters, "But the boys are missing."
"Let me guess, Yugi, Yami and Joey are with you?"
"That's right." Ombre nodded. "We got split up."
The three of them paused as they heard the sound of heavy breathing, turning to look down the path as Yami and Yugi paused as they caught sight of them, then before anyone saw Yugi move, he'd glomped his Grandfather, causing Solomon to groan, Yugi wasn't as small as he'd once been and he'd grown taller then his Grandfather, not that that could be considered hard.
"You're safe!" Yugi sounded so relieved that Ombre smiled slightly, "Don't ever scare me like that again."
Solomon chuckled as Yugi let go, looking at his second Grandson.
"I'm pleased to see you are safe and well." Yami smiled.
That was enough for Solomon. He knew Yami wasn't one for overly emotional displays and that natural smile was more then a lot of people got out of the Pharaoh.
"Have you found Joey yet?" Serenity asked, looking down when she saw Yugi's shoulders sink and Yami shake his head.
"We'll find him." Yami sounded confident, "Joey's tough, he'll be fine until we meet up with him."
"How did you lot get here?" Solomon demanded.
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Harry had known something was wrong the moment that his, strained as it was, link to Yami and Yugi had gone completely. The phone call had only confirmed this.
"We wouldn't be any help Harry." Sirius tried to reason with his Godson, who had been acting irritable for the last few hours, needing an explanation for the sudden loss of the currently tenuous link that connected him to the Muto 'twins', but unable to reach anyone's phones.
He knew what day it was. Today was the day that they'd been due to go on holiday to India, which meant that the Game Shop was empty so he couldn't call there and he had already tried their mobile numbers, which he had gotten off of Yugi a couple of days ago luckily, and all of them had been switched off.
"We have to do something, Sirius; they're my brothers and sisters!" Harry protested, though he knew that the adults would consider an underage wizard to be little help in the search, never mind the mind link that bound Harry, Yugi and Yami together, after Yami had helped his mind recover from the stress of the Shadow Realm… no… he'd be considered a pest and kept away from the area.
"Kaiba's already got people looking, they'll find them Harry."
"But it's Yugi and Yami! They could be neck deep in trouble by now! You know what Mokuba said! Yami left behind his Dark Magician! Yami never leaves his Dark Magician anywhere!"
"Maybe he dropped it, he could be perfectly fine for all you know, the link isn't perfect this far away. You've had it vanish intermittently for days now…"
"It's been getting better since we've been heading east." Harry scowled, remembering the moments that the link, which had been playing up with Yugi and Yami in Japan and Harry in France, had vanished, nearly scaring Harry half to death since he knew what that could possibly mean, and causing some rather odd phone calls at rather odd times of the day until they'd left France and started travelling East, stopping at Tournaments on the way… Harry blamed Sirius… when it had at least become stable, though talking or sensing emotions was still impossible.
It was enough for Harry that he could sense that they were alright.
And several hours ago, that feeling had vanished.
"It's Monday today, give it a week, Harry. If the link's not back or Yugi hasn't phoned you by Sunday, we'll go, alright?"
Harry shook his head. "Tomorrow."
"Saturday."
"Tuesday."
"Friday."
"Wednesday."
"Thursday." Sirius offered, knowing just how worried his Godson was, but not understanding how they could be any more useful then fully trained search patrols.
"Wednesday night." Harry offered back, feeling bad for badgering, but needing to know his family were alright.
"Deal." Sirius agreed. "If Yugi hasn't phoned by seven pm on Wednesday, English time, mind." He added, "We'll head to Japan."
"Alright." Harry nodded, unhappy and not really willing to wait that long, he would though, for Sirius.
"Shall we get ready to go out then?" Sirius asked, amused when Harry sorted out his bandana, which covered his scar and was a present from Duke Devlin, though the dog animagus wished it was any colour other then green.
Harry nodded. Three days… he would wait three days…
Sirius hadn't made him agree not to phone…
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Night had fallen in the game and they'd gathered around a camp fire in order to cook some of the food that Yugi had had the foresight to pack. What Yugi hadn't packed in his bag, which he'd put the extension charm on so he could get more stuff in it, Solomon had in his pack, so the meal was in fact quite reasonable.
But it didn't put anyone's mind at rest. Joey was still out there, lost in the wilderness and alone and… Yugi's head came to rest on his knees, not hungry in the slightest at the thought that Joey could be out there somewhere, hungry and injured, while they were enjoying their meal.
'You need to eat, hikari,' Yami sent, trying not to worry the others any further then they already were, 'You'll be no good tomorrow if you let yourself wear down and don't eat.'
"But Joey…"
'Joey's capable of looking after himself and has his own supplies, or don't you believe what you told Serenity earlier?' Yami asked. 'That Joey would be fine and would probably meet us coming around the next corner?'
Yugi sent him the equivalent of a glare, not overly happy with Yami quoting his own words back at him. He heard Yami give a soft, amused snort, but didn't answer his question. It was easy to be strong for other people while they were on the move, they had to do it all the time, but when they stopped, the fear gnawed away at him, and he knew Yami knew it.
It didn't help that he could sense Yami was worried too, and was just better at faking that he wasn't, then Yugi.
"I just had a thought." Ombre snorted, looking at Yami and Yugi, who both blinked and looked at her simultaneously. "Harry's got to be freaking out right about now."
"Harry doesn't freak out. He just gets… concerned."
Ombre looked partially amused, "He's going to be freaking out and if you don't ring him the moment that we get out of this game, he'll probably bring the whole family to find us."
"Hermione." Yugi face palmed, "She's going to kill me."
"What?"
"Hermione doesn't kill people."
"She will," Yugi responded, shaking his head, "She made me promise to phone at the first sign of weirdness."
"In your defence the phones weren't working."
"She might let me live then…" Yugi considered it.
"Seto won't worry." Ombre said.
"Seto probably already has a search party out looking for us." Yami chuckled, "I don't want to win the title because my rivals are missing, now find them or I'll get all of you fired!"
He said the latter while doing an impression of Seto, which was even funnier when, in the same tone of voice, he yelped, moving back a couple of foot, because Joey had fallen from the sky and had been caught by a Baby Dragon, his face stopping just inches from Yami's.
"Uh… hi."
"Joey!" Yugi and Serenity grinned at the same time, as Baby Dragon set Joey down and returned to his capsule.
In a heartbeat Joey had his sister clinging to him, telling him never to do that again, and if he scared her like that again she was going to do something drastic. Once she'd calmed down, Joey smiled at Yugi and Yami. "You alright bros?"
"We're good, better now you're back with the group." Yami nodded as Yugi hugged his friend.
Joey looked over Yugi's head to his grandfather, "You ok, Gramps?"
"I'm fine." Solomon nodded, amused as Yugi sat back down and proceeded to eat his food hastily.
"Ombre?" Joey asked, with a nod.
"I'm ok." Ombre nodded back.
"You got any of that grub left?" Joey asked. "I'm starved."
"I thought you said you had food." Yami frowned.
"Chocolate bars." Joey scowled.
"Huh?" Everyone but Yugi looked confused. The hikari however, who had luckily just swallowed a mouthful, started laughing.
"It's not funny Yugi!" Joey protested.
"What's so funny?"
"Mai… food… cooked… chocolate bars!" Yugi gasped between giggles. "Duellist Kingdom."
"Give me a break!" Joey complained, "I was still learning!"
"Be nice Yugi or I will give Joey your second helpings." Solomon scolded.
"Sorry." Yugi gasped, trying to calm down.
"We were just discussing who's going to be freaking out the most." Yami advised, trying not to look too amused at his hikari's state.
"That's easy," Joey said as Solomon dished him up a helping, "In order, Harry, Hermione, Seto, Mokuba… Ron won't freak, because he only ever seems to freak out about the wrong things."
"Don't be mean." Yugi scolded.
"I'm not being mean, I'm being honest." Joey protested.
"He has a point. If he's going to freak out about any part of this whole situation, it's going to be because we didn't bring him along." Yami frowned.
There was silence for a moment as Yugi found he couldn't deny this and Ombre frowned as she considered their surroundings. "Hey guys, is it me, or did those flowers move closer?"
The others looked around.
Joey scrambled to his feet, "Uh oh."
"I hate uh oh." Yugi groaned as he got to his own, already reaching for his capsule, recognising that Ombre was right, "It's right up there with fine and oops."
"I thought you said that we had to get over our aversion to 'fine'." Yami prodded, wondering just how much help his Hinotama Soul was going to be.
"Are you going to be quoting things back at me all the way through this game?" Yugi asked irritably.
"Game?" Joey asked.
"This is a Shadow Game, isn't it?" Ombre scowled at Yugi and Yami. They nodded, "I knew it when I felt the injuries my monster sustained."
"A Shadow Game!" Joey yelped, "But that would mean the only way out is to win."
"J…Joey?" Serenity asked, backing up against him as the flowers grew nearer, growling.
"Talk later." Yami advised, "Load capsule!"
Simultaneously, the five younger ones loaded their monsters, launching their capsules at the same time, as Solomon picked up a flaming stick and threw it into the flowers.
Their shadows revealed what they were.
"Flower Wolves!" Yami hissed, scowling as Solomon realised that his capsule was still unusable and an odd shade of silver and picked up another blazing stick as the wolves launched their attack.
"Celtic Guardian!" Yugi yelled, throwing his arm forward, "Attack!" Celtic Guardian's sword cut through the two that had launched themselves at him.
"Baby Dragon! Show us what you can do!" Joey called, pride in his voice as the little orange dragon leapt forward, slamming the Flower Wolves with its tail. One Flower Wolf dodged around the swinging tail and bit into the dragon's side.
Joey cried out, clutching his side.
"Hinotama Soul, help him!" Yami ordered.
The floating fire ball shot forward, setting the wolf's flowers alight. It barked and let go, but a second one slammed into it, singeing its fur but sending it crashing into the ground.
Yami groaned and sunk to his knees.
"Yami!" Serenity's Mystical Elf lured a group away and Yugi was about to help her when his Celtic Guardian was assaulted by a group of Flower Wolves who bit the monster's shoulder and side.
Yugi cried out and Yami struggled to his feet to try to work out a way to help both, settling for grabbing a flaming stick and attacking the wolves attacking Celtic Guardian as Hinotama Soul burnt one of the ones attacking Baby Dragon.
Yami's eyes widened as his Grandpa attempted to fight the wolves off with one of the pieces of lit wood, only to be saved by Ombre's Gigantes, the only monster they had with more attack points then these wolves.
"We need a plan." Yami growled, before dodging a pair of Flower Wolves and falling backwards, having tripped over a stone at his feet. Hinotama Soul burnt one wolf and the other was sliced in two by the monster that had appeared when Yami had hit a capsule that had been mostly buried in the ground. "King's Knight…" Yami murmured. The monster leapt forward, slicing more wolves in two.
"There's too many!" Joey yelled.
"We just need to blind them long enough to get away…" Yugi thought quickly, "Cover your eyes!"
"What?" Joey yelped.
Yami sensed Yugi gather his magic, "Do it!" Yami snapped, already closing his.
The others followed suit just in time as Yugi sent out a wave of light that knocked back all the wolves and by the time that it had faded, the humans had gone, leaving only the campfire and the bags behind.