November 26th: - 2149 words
Joey hadn’t thought it was possible for Blue Eyes White Dragons to sulk, but Orya and Kari were doing rather good impressions of doing just that.
The other two Blue Eyes sisters had caught up with them not longer after Tobias, Kisara and Elise had been done with the camp and were currently irritated that they hadn’t had a chance to do anything to help.
Joey still felt a twinge of guilt over the assault; though in their defence the amulets had led them there first meaning that Yugi had been there until his position had suddenly jumped, as the creatures that hadn’t already vanished had stood no chance against the powerful beasts that had invaded their airspace.
If anything the attack had been useful. Even if Medan and Yugi had left just before the attack had started, they had successfully managed to cut down the amount of creatures that were under Medan’s command by over half, a fact that was going to make the next part so much easier.
Not that they could pull the same stunt twice. The beacons had led them from the rather easy to access camp at the ruins to a cave system that, while it would fit dragons in easily, would not be approachable from the air, which cut out the possibility of doing the same thing they had done before, the dragons softening up the camp in advance so that the ground troops could finish up easily when they got there.
Instead they were doing something Joey had never been very good at.
Waiting.
“I swear Mutt, if you take one more step...” Seto snarled at him as Joey completed his thirty second lap of the route he was pacing.
“Oh blow it out your rear, Rich Boy.” Joey snapped back, before letting out a deep breath and turning away from the CEO to lean against a tree.
He was trying not to bite so much when Kaiba snapped, at least not at the moment, not until he could be sure that Seto’s temper wasn’t still his anger over the murder of a close friend and loyal employee, but sometimes it was really hard because Seto knew exactly how to push his buttons. A side effect, he supposed of all the years that they’d known each other, even if they hadn’t always been on polite speaking terms.
The problem was everyone knew how much of an impact the English Duellist had had on the CEO of Kaiba Corp. She’d worked for him too long and done far too much for Kaiba, both personally and professionally, for him to be able to blow her off as he had Yugi, if only because she’d taken it upon herself to do everything in her power to make sure that Kaiba Corp ran smoothly and the CEO didn’t kill himself via overworking.
Once she’d stopped being terrified of Kaiba of course...
“We’d know if anything had happened to Yugi.” Joey spoke, thinking out loud as much as trying to reassure himself and Tobias, possibly Kaiba and the Blue Eyes sisters as well, but they seemed to be surprisingly relaxed about all of this, and trying not to think about the feeling of something being very wrong that he had had earlier. “Well, I would.” Joey stated, glancing at Kaiba who seemed completely ill amused by everything. “Tea and Tristan would too, no matter how far away they are. We knew the moment Yugi got hurt in his Shadow Game with Pegasus after all.”
Seto had never actually heard that story, though he was sure that their Gryffindor friends had. He’d known that Yugi had fought a Shadow Game with Pegasus and that he and Mokuba owed Yugi and Atem their souls, a debt that he had yet to repay and wasn’t ever sure he would, but he’d never been told that Yugi had been injured during that fight, yet alone that the rest of the ‘dweeb brigade’ had known the moment it had happened.
The CEO just snorted. He’d never bothered with the whole false hope thing, it had never done him any good in the past, it wouldn’t be any good to him now, and he wasn’t going to enable Wheeler, especially when it was likely that if anything did happen the blonde would just whale on the nearest available person and currently that happened to him.
Not that he couldn’t take the mutt in a fair fight, but he’d watched the guy teaching the others to fight long enough to know that while Wheeler’s sense of fair play counted in almost everything, when it came to a fight, he was quite happy to play dirty. A tribute to his days in a street gang most likely.
“Tobias, what...” Joey trailed off when his dragon, quite snippily, commented that it was, in fact, five minutes later then the last time he’d ask, getting a little irritated with his Duellist, even as he agreed that waiting around probably wasn’t the best idea, and amusing Seto.
Noises in the bushes caused both Duellists to turn to face them, drawing from their decks ready in case it was an enemy, only to find Atem giving them a bemused look as he stared down a Flame Swordsman and a Different Dimension Dragon.
“Jumpy much?” One of the Spellcasters, a Magician’s Valkyria if Seto was right, and he generally was, asked just as amused as the Pharaoh at their reactions to the arrival of the rest of the group.
Kisara just snorted at her. The four star Light Spellcaster gave the Queen of the Light Lands an apologetic look and settled down quietly, having been among those who had been picked up by the two Blue Eyes White Dragons, specifically because of her special ability.
She and a couple of others of her card type were going to swing the battle in the favour of Mahado and his forces as they implemented a lock down on any attacks on Spellcaster Monsters. It didn’t help the dragons any, but it did protect the majority of the forces they had brought with them.
Between them and the traps and spells in the decks of the three Duellists, they were reasonably confident that they should succeed. Not that they were taking it as a given yet, most wouldn’t even acknowledge the fact that they should have the advantage in case they caused a case of Murphy’s Law that screwed them up completely.
“So,” Joey said, moving away from his tree and turning to look at the Pharaoh, “What’s the plan?”
“That’s a trap.” Atem stated rather unnecessarily of the, apparently, unguarded entrance to the underground cave system at the very edge of the Wastelands. “One we need to spring.”
“I can do that.” Joey nodded. “What else?”
“Medan has us over a barrel while he has Yugi.” Mahado stated, “We’ll need a big enough distraction that a small group can get deep into the cave system and get him out.”
Joey chuckled. “Big distractions?” He asked, gesturing towards the Blue Eyes White Dragons and Tobias, causing the dragons to hiss at him, in half real, half mock irritation, not really liking the fact they wouldn’t be able to fly down there.
“We wouldn’t expect you lot to do it alone.” Atem told them, trying to sound reassuring, “You’d have a lot of back up but...”
“We can handle a few Fiends.” Kaiba interrupted with a snort.
“Hey Rich Boy, round two?” Joey asked with a smirk, causing Atem to roll his eyes as he remembered the ‘game’ the pair of them had been playing in the Capsule Monsters world during the final battle with the Skull Knights that had kept regenerating.
“While they’re grandstanding,” Atem turned to Mahado, who was certain he knew what the Pharaoh was going to say, as Joey spluttered and Kaiba glowered at him, “I’ll take a small team and try and find Yugi.”
“My Pharaoh, though I know you won’t listen to me on this subject, I’d rather you weren’t in that group.” Mahado stated, “You’d be much better off in the diversionary group. You are, after all, the Pharaoh and as such, you are the biggest target on the field.”
“These aren’t my men.” Atem pointed out, gesturing to the Dark Spellcasters around them, tactically reminding that while Mahado was deferring to him, the monsters that had followed them had done so because Mahado the Lord of the Dark Kingdom, had ordered them to do so. “You’d be better off leading them then I would.”
The admission surprised Mahado. While he’d been friends with Atem back in Egypt, the Pharaoh he’d known back then would never have admitted a weakness, only carried on going, even if he didn’t know exactly what he was getting into.
It was probably only concern for Yugi that allowed Atem to make the admission now. The Pharaoh would want the best men for the job doing the job in question and would want to go after Medan and rescue the Light half of his soul himself.
"If I might interrupt this conversation,” Joey said, interposing himself between Mahado and Atem, looking amused, “There’s an easy way around this argument.”
Atem’s eyebrows went up and Mahado gave him a speculative look. “Indeed?”
“The pair of you distract the bad guys and let me go in.” Joey said, holding up a hand when the pair of them went to protest. “Medan’s going to be looking for the pair of you. If he doesn’t see either of you, he’s going to know something’s up. He won’t be looking for me, no one does. Let me go in and get Yuge. I’m sure Rich Boy doesn’t mind backing you up.”
Seto scowled at him, “We can handle it on our own.” His dragons roared in agreement.
“I thank you, but I don’t expect you to do it alone.” Atem told him, before turning back to Joey, “I trust you, Joey.”
“I know.” And Joey did. He knew the weight of the trust Atem had in him. That he was one of very few whose hands Atem would, willingly, put Yugi’s life in. Not even some of their closest friends had that level of trust from the King.
Atem considered him a moment longer, then he nodded, “I trust you with this.” The Pharaoh said, offering his hand. “Bring him back safe.”
“I will.” Joey clasped Atem’s arm. “Be careful.”
“I will.” Joey nodded, before picking out three monsters from his deck to take with him, telling Tobias to behave for the Pharaoh, and heading down towards the cave.
“Let us trigger this trap then.” Mahado nodded to the Pharaoh, surprised by the maturity shown by the young men in question. He wasn’t quite sure when Joey had changed from the goofball he had been to the strong warrior who was about to make his way through the cave system.
“Indeed.” Atem nodded, “Are you with us, Seto?”
Seto snorted, wondering how long it would be before Atem called him Seth by accident again, “Just get on with it before I change my mind.”
Atem let out a chuckle, though he could appreciate Seto’s attitude, “Alright, Seto.” He nodded as Mahado started organising the troops, “Let’s go make Joey a way in.”
It didn’t take much to spring the first wave of the assault. Just turning up at the cave’s entrance with a large enough group was enough to cause a group of monsters to come rushing out.
“Is this all there is?” Seto asked, eying up the opposition with a smirk on his face as he looked at the hand he’d pulled, glancing up at the four Blue Eyes White Dragons who were just waiting for the order. “I assumed the first wave would be more dangerous than this.”
“Now now Seto.” Atem sounded amused, gesturing to Mahado, who started the counter offensive, casting Magic Formula on the first Dark Magician as the purple robed mage blew away a Bickuribox, “They can’t help it if none of their attack points match up to the strength of our friends.”
“Please don’t start with the friendship speeches.” Seto snorted, as the Blue Eyes White Dragons started attacking, “Especially when my girls are going to defeat Medan’s forces by themselves.”
Mahado gave Atem a long suffering look as a second wave piled out of the cave and Joey and his trio slipped in behind them.
“Everyone but Mahado duck.” Atem advised, ignoring Seto’s posturing, casting Diffusion Wave Motion as he did so, wincing slightly with the energy loss, but deciding it was worth it when Mahado’s attack blew away every enemy monster who’d left the cave with, by the game’s standards, less than thirty two hundred attack points.
“Like I’d let you have all the fun.” Atem smirked at Kaiba who just glowered back. “By the way, I think I’m ahead...”
The other two Blue Eyes sisters had caught up with them not longer after Tobias, Kisara and Elise had been done with the camp and were currently irritated that they hadn’t had a chance to do anything to help.
Joey still felt a twinge of guilt over the assault; though in their defence the amulets had led them there first meaning that Yugi had been there until his position had suddenly jumped, as the creatures that hadn’t already vanished had stood no chance against the powerful beasts that had invaded their airspace.
If anything the attack had been useful. Even if Medan and Yugi had left just before the attack had started, they had successfully managed to cut down the amount of creatures that were under Medan’s command by over half, a fact that was going to make the next part so much easier.
Not that they could pull the same stunt twice. The beacons had led them from the rather easy to access camp at the ruins to a cave system that, while it would fit dragons in easily, would not be approachable from the air, which cut out the possibility of doing the same thing they had done before, the dragons softening up the camp in advance so that the ground troops could finish up easily when they got there.
Instead they were doing something Joey had never been very good at.
Waiting.
“I swear Mutt, if you take one more step...” Seto snarled at him as Joey completed his thirty second lap of the route he was pacing.
“Oh blow it out your rear, Rich Boy.” Joey snapped back, before letting out a deep breath and turning away from the CEO to lean against a tree.
He was trying not to bite so much when Kaiba snapped, at least not at the moment, not until he could be sure that Seto’s temper wasn’t still his anger over the murder of a close friend and loyal employee, but sometimes it was really hard because Seto knew exactly how to push his buttons. A side effect, he supposed of all the years that they’d known each other, even if they hadn’t always been on polite speaking terms.
The problem was everyone knew how much of an impact the English Duellist had had on the CEO of Kaiba Corp. She’d worked for him too long and done far too much for Kaiba, both personally and professionally, for him to be able to blow her off as he had Yugi, if only because she’d taken it upon herself to do everything in her power to make sure that Kaiba Corp ran smoothly and the CEO didn’t kill himself via overworking.
Once she’d stopped being terrified of Kaiba of course...
“We’d know if anything had happened to Yugi.” Joey spoke, thinking out loud as much as trying to reassure himself and Tobias, possibly Kaiba and the Blue Eyes sisters as well, but they seemed to be surprisingly relaxed about all of this, and trying not to think about the feeling of something being very wrong that he had had earlier. “Well, I would.” Joey stated, glancing at Kaiba who seemed completely ill amused by everything. “Tea and Tristan would too, no matter how far away they are. We knew the moment Yugi got hurt in his Shadow Game with Pegasus after all.”
Seto had never actually heard that story, though he was sure that their Gryffindor friends had. He’d known that Yugi had fought a Shadow Game with Pegasus and that he and Mokuba owed Yugi and Atem their souls, a debt that he had yet to repay and wasn’t ever sure he would, but he’d never been told that Yugi had been injured during that fight, yet alone that the rest of the ‘dweeb brigade’ had known the moment it had happened.
The CEO just snorted. He’d never bothered with the whole false hope thing, it had never done him any good in the past, it wouldn’t be any good to him now, and he wasn’t going to enable Wheeler, especially when it was likely that if anything did happen the blonde would just whale on the nearest available person and currently that happened to him.
Not that he couldn’t take the mutt in a fair fight, but he’d watched the guy teaching the others to fight long enough to know that while Wheeler’s sense of fair play counted in almost everything, when it came to a fight, he was quite happy to play dirty. A tribute to his days in a street gang most likely.
“Tobias, what...” Joey trailed off when his dragon, quite snippily, commented that it was, in fact, five minutes later then the last time he’d ask, getting a little irritated with his Duellist, even as he agreed that waiting around probably wasn’t the best idea, and amusing Seto.
Noises in the bushes caused both Duellists to turn to face them, drawing from their decks ready in case it was an enemy, only to find Atem giving them a bemused look as he stared down a Flame Swordsman and a Different Dimension Dragon.
“Jumpy much?” One of the Spellcasters, a Magician’s Valkyria if Seto was right, and he generally was, asked just as amused as the Pharaoh at their reactions to the arrival of the rest of the group.
Kisara just snorted at her. The four star Light Spellcaster gave the Queen of the Light Lands an apologetic look and settled down quietly, having been among those who had been picked up by the two Blue Eyes White Dragons, specifically because of her special ability.
She and a couple of others of her card type were going to swing the battle in the favour of Mahado and his forces as they implemented a lock down on any attacks on Spellcaster Monsters. It didn’t help the dragons any, but it did protect the majority of the forces they had brought with them.
Between them and the traps and spells in the decks of the three Duellists, they were reasonably confident that they should succeed. Not that they were taking it as a given yet, most wouldn’t even acknowledge the fact that they should have the advantage in case they caused a case of Murphy’s Law that screwed them up completely.
“So,” Joey said, moving away from his tree and turning to look at the Pharaoh, “What’s the plan?”
“That’s a trap.” Atem stated rather unnecessarily of the, apparently, unguarded entrance to the underground cave system at the very edge of the Wastelands. “One we need to spring.”
“I can do that.” Joey nodded. “What else?”
“Medan has us over a barrel while he has Yugi.” Mahado stated, “We’ll need a big enough distraction that a small group can get deep into the cave system and get him out.”
Joey chuckled. “Big distractions?” He asked, gesturing towards the Blue Eyes White Dragons and Tobias, causing the dragons to hiss at him, in half real, half mock irritation, not really liking the fact they wouldn’t be able to fly down there.
“We wouldn’t expect you lot to do it alone.” Atem told them, trying to sound reassuring, “You’d have a lot of back up but...”
“We can handle a few Fiends.” Kaiba interrupted with a snort.
“Hey Rich Boy, round two?” Joey asked with a smirk, causing Atem to roll his eyes as he remembered the ‘game’ the pair of them had been playing in the Capsule Monsters world during the final battle with the Skull Knights that had kept regenerating.
“While they’re grandstanding,” Atem turned to Mahado, who was certain he knew what the Pharaoh was going to say, as Joey spluttered and Kaiba glowered at him, “I’ll take a small team and try and find Yugi.”
“My Pharaoh, though I know you won’t listen to me on this subject, I’d rather you weren’t in that group.” Mahado stated, “You’d be much better off in the diversionary group. You are, after all, the Pharaoh and as such, you are the biggest target on the field.”
“These aren’t my men.” Atem pointed out, gesturing to the Dark Spellcasters around them, tactically reminding that while Mahado was deferring to him, the monsters that had followed them had done so because Mahado the Lord of the Dark Kingdom, had ordered them to do so. “You’d be better off leading them then I would.”
The admission surprised Mahado. While he’d been friends with Atem back in Egypt, the Pharaoh he’d known back then would never have admitted a weakness, only carried on going, even if he didn’t know exactly what he was getting into.
It was probably only concern for Yugi that allowed Atem to make the admission now. The Pharaoh would want the best men for the job doing the job in question and would want to go after Medan and rescue the Light half of his soul himself.
"If I might interrupt this conversation,” Joey said, interposing himself between Mahado and Atem, looking amused, “There’s an easy way around this argument.”
Atem’s eyebrows went up and Mahado gave him a speculative look. “Indeed?”
“The pair of you distract the bad guys and let me go in.” Joey said, holding up a hand when the pair of them went to protest. “Medan’s going to be looking for the pair of you. If he doesn’t see either of you, he’s going to know something’s up. He won’t be looking for me, no one does. Let me go in and get Yuge. I’m sure Rich Boy doesn’t mind backing you up.”
Seto scowled at him, “We can handle it on our own.” His dragons roared in agreement.
“I thank you, but I don’t expect you to do it alone.” Atem told him, before turning back to Joey, “I trust you, Joey.”
“I know.” And Joey did. He knew the weight of the trust Atem had in him. That he was one of very few whose hands Atem would, willingly, put Yugi’s life in. Not even some of their closest friends had that level of trust from the King.
Atem considered him a moment longer, then he nodded, “I trust you with this.” The Pharaoh said, offering his hand. “Bring him back safe.”
“I will.” Joey clasped Atem’s arm. “Be careful.”
“I will.” Joey nodded, before picking out three monsters from his deck to take with him, telling Tobias to behave for the Pharaoh, and heading down towards the cave.
“Let us trigger this trap then.” Mahado nodded to the Pharaoh, surprised by the maturity shown by the young men in question. He wasn’t quite sure when Joey had changed from the goofball he had been to the strong warrior who was about to make his way through the cave system.
“Indeed.” Atem nodded, “Are you with us, Seto?”
Seto snorted, wondering how long it would be before Atem called him Seth by accident again, “Just get on with it before I change my mind.”
Atem let out a chuckle, though he could appreciate Seto’s attitude, “Alright, Seto.” He nodded as Mahado started organising the troops, “Let’s go make Joey a way in.”
It didn’t take much to spring the first wave of the assault. Just turning up at the cave’s entrance with a large enough group was enough to cause a group of monsters to come rushing out.
“Is this all there is?” Seto asked, eying up the opposition with a smirk on his face as he looked at the hand he’d pulled, glancing up at the four Blue Eyes White Dragons who were just waiting for the order. “I assumed the first wave would be more dangerous than this.”
“Now now Seto.” Atem sounded amused, gesturing to Mahado, who started the counter offensive, casting Magic Formula on the first Dark Magician as the purple robed mage blew away a Bickuribox, “They can’t help it if none of their attack points match up to the strength of our friends.”
“Please don’t start with the friendship speeches.” Seto snorted, as the Blue Eyes White Dragons started attacking, “Especially when my girls are going to defeat Medan’s forces by themselves.”
Mahado gave Atem a long suffering look as a second wave piled out of the cave and Joey and his trio slipped in behind them.
“Everyone but Mahado duck.” Atem advised, ignoring Seto’s posturing, casting Diffusion Wave Motion as he did so, wincing slightly with the energy loss, but deciding it was worth it when Mahado’s attack blew away every enemy monster who’d left the cave with, by the game’s standards, less than thirty two hundred attack points.
“Like I’d let you have all the fun.” Atem smirked at Kaiba who just glowered back. “By the way, I think I’m ahead...”