Chapter 15: - Fallen
"Serenity!"
Joey would have vaulted the railings, despite the long drop, if his sister hadn't been in the middle of a Duel.
"Joey?" Serenity wheeled around at Joey's desperate call. "Joey, is that really you?"
"Yeah, I'm here." Joey nodded, giving his sister a reassuring smile.
"Where's Tristan?" Tea called down, as Yugi tried to read the duel, realising that, if it wasn't for Perfect Machine King, Serenity and Duke would have the advantage, "Wasn't he with you?"
The way Duke's shoulders sank and Serenity teared up told Jamie what she needed to know, even as Duke confirmed it. "He's gone. Tristan fell."
"What?" Tea gasped.
"Tristan lost the duel." Duke replied.
"He was protecting me." Serenity sounded miserable.
Duke was irritated by Tristan's actions. Yes Nesbit had been focusing on Serenity, but she'd known the basics well enough to put up a decent defence so far. If Tristan had thought about what was going on, instead of being determined to take all the damage aimed at Serenity himself, there was a good chance that all three of them would still be in the game.
"But that means… oh no…" Tea sank to her knees, Yugi gripped the railing tightly and Joey scowled.
"Make room, I'm joining in." Joey said, preparing to vault the railings and jump down to the metal crates below.
"Negative." Nesbit rumbled, "Interference will not be allowed. The duel will continue."
Jamie watched Joey give his sister reassurance, recognising both the confidence he was trying to project to his sister, and the helpless feeling that was hidden underneath.
She knew how that felt, knowing that your little sister was in danger and being unable to do much about it.
A memory flashed past, of baiting the Admin in charge of the Magma grunts who had overrun her home town into a three on three Pokémon battle, knowing full well that she only had one Pokémon left to battle with, knowing that if her Marshtomp fainted, she would lose the battle and there would be nothing she could do, knowing that if she failed, her life and the lives of her sister and her sister's friends would be forfeit...
'You have a sister?'
Bakura's voice shocked her out of the fear filled memories of the battle, just in time to watch Serenity's Saint Joan defeat Perfect Machine King and win the duel.
"Just one. My little sister, Lizzie. She's a Pokémon Trainer, like me." She sensed Bakura's amusement at the pride in her mental 'voice'. "Been travelling for a year and a bit now."
'You never mentioned her.'
"You never mentioned your family either." Jamie replied, watching Joey hug his sister, unable to help the pang of jealousy that made her heart ache. "It hurts to talk about her."
Bakura understood that all too well. Even now, five thousand years down the line, he didn't like talking about his family.
Jamie reached the bottom step in time to hear Duke ask, "So what's the plan?"
"The enemy would have escaped into Tristan's body by now." She said, causing everyone to look at her, "But his mind will be in this virtual world somewhere."
"That's true." Yugi nodded, thinking. "We just have to find it."
"But how are we going to find him?" Duke demanded, "He could be anywhere, and Noa's not exactly going to make this easy!"
'They're forgetting that without a body, Tristan won't be able to return to the human world.' Bakura reminded her, trying not to be too amused by the situation.
"You have a point." Jamie muttered, catching Yugi's attention.
"Bakura have something to say?" He asked, causing Serenity and Duke to stare at her, as if seeing the Ring hanging around her neck for the first time.
"Finding his mind's all well and good, but he has no body to return to, unless you plan on sharing with him."
"I'm not sharing." Duke shook his head violently.
"I do have one idea. We split into two groups." Jamie said, thinking carefully. "One looks for Tristan's mind, the other tries to hunt down the bad guy…"
"Nesbit." Duke interrupted.
"…Tries to hunt down Nesbit. See if he's still in the virtual world."
"We're not splitting up again." Joey growled.
"Then what's your plan?"
"We find Tristan's mind, then we hunt down Noa and shake him upside down until he lets us out of here."
"That doesn't solve the issue of Tristan not having a body." She reminded him.
"Splitting up isn't a good idea." Jamie scowled as she realised who was out. The Pharaoh looked thoughtful as he continued. "But there may be another way."
"Do tell, Pharaoh." Joey gave her a sharp look when her tone sounded slightly hostile, noting that her eyes were darker, and there were lighter streaks in her hair. Had Bakura spoken through her for a moment?
"We challenge Noa. Nesbit didn't win the duel, so he should have freed Tristan. Considering his addiction to sticking to the rules, there's a chance that, if we beat Noa, he'll let us all go. Tristan included."
"Might work." Jamie acknowledged.
"Yugi no!" Tea protested. "If you challenge Noa, he'll try and steal your body!"
"He'll only take it if I lose." Yami reminded her.
"That's not strictly true." Jamie shook her head, wanting to warn them for Yugi's sake, rather then Yami's, "I've fought him once already. He tried to steal my body after I won. He only failed because of…" She indicated the Millennium Ring.
"So much for sticking to the rules." Joey snorted.
"So what? We just let them get away with it?" Duke demanded.
"No." Yugi was out again and he was thinking. "Let's find Tristan's mind, then we'll deal with Noa."
"What about Nesbit?"
'The problem would be solved if he ran into Marik.'
Jamie snorted, acknowledging Bakura's point. "We've beat Noa once. Let us try."
"I dunno…" Joey looked wary for a moment and Jamie felt insulted until she realised that he was worried about Bakura pulling something.
"Fine…" Jamie scowled. "Noa I know you're watching, you Muk! I want a word!" She bellowed. "You're breaking your word. You said you'd free me when I found my friends."
Noa, scowling at her accusation of duplicity, appeared on the balcony they had arrived at. "You're missing one." He pointed out.
"Where's Tristan?" She demanded. "Nesbit had no right to take control of his body."
"Oh don't you worry." Noa smirked, "I haven't freed Nesbit yet, he's still in here. He didn't earn the right to take that body."
"So both Nesbit and Tristan are still in the virtual world?"
"That's correct." Noa nodded. "Have fun looking." He vanished.
"You were going to leave us behind?" Joey wheeled on her.
"No. Actually I got the information we needed without anyone being left on the outside with Marik." Jamie snorted back at him. "Nesbit's still in this virtual world, which means there's a chance we can force him to give up his claim on Tristan."
"So all we have to do is find Tristan and Nesbit and we're set." Duke nodded.
"Well played." Yugi smiled at her.
"Thanks Yugi." Jamie nodded back, "Shall we?" She gestured towards a door on the right hand side.
"Let's go."
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1 Month 2 Weeks Ago – Kanto Region, New Forest
They were a group of ten to fifteen Trainers of varying ages, ranging from Judy, Rex and Raven, who were the oldest at 17, to Gillian, the youngest at 10, who had only left on her journey a few days before Viridian had given itself up to the invaders from Team Galactic and forced out any League sympathisers.
They'd been travelling for a couple of weeks now, heading north, having passed through Pewter City, and were now just north of Mt Moon, hoping to settle in Brunswick Village, which was full of history, but didn't have anything like a Gym or a Pokémon Lab to attract the bad guys.
"LEAVE ME ALONE!" A child's scream caused everyone in the small, temporary camp to freeze.
"Rex, Raven!" Judy demanded, already on her feet and moving towards the sound when the two boys shook off the shock and got to their feet.
She darted through the trees, sending out her Shedinja, who moved much faster then she could, the Bug/Ghost type unhampered by the need to go around trees, and by the time she'd caught up, it was floating between an injured girl, who was clutching a Pokémon Egg close to her chest and couldn't be more then six or seven, and a Mightyena obviously belonging to the huge thug that glowered at her on her arrival.
"Stay out of this. That girl is property of Team Cipher." He snarled at her.
"No I'm not!" The pink haired girl protested shakily, "I don't belong to anyone!"
Judy moved behind her Shedinja as the two boys burst into the area, going to the girl's side as Rex's Vulpix and Raven's Raichu joined her Shed Pokémon.
"Who's the creep?" Rex asked confidently, deliberately smirked, antagonising the thug into focusing on him rather then the girls, not that Judy wasn't a good Trainer, but he'd rather she dealt with the girl, and he dealt with the bad guy. He was bad at dealing with children under ten.
"I'm Ruben, of Team Snagum." The thug sounded all too happy about that, "Get out of my way."
"No." Raven replied, glowering. He'd heard of Team Snagum, even before the League had let Galactic capture Palkia. He'd fought alongside his good friend, Iason, in the last civil war against Team Cipher in their home lands of Orre, and where there was Cipher, there was often Snagum.
"I'm Judy Frost, of Shamuti Island. I'm a League Trainer." She smiled softly at the girl, "I won't let him lay a hand on you." She offered the girl a hand up.
The girl hesitated, but then took her hand. Judy felt a presence touch her mind, like that of Slowking's or Jynx's when they spoke mind to mind with her, then it was gone. The girl's pensive look turned to a real smile, "I'm Danielle Rouge, of Brunswick Village…" She looked at the floor, "Or… I was… I have no where now…"
Ruben's smirk irked Rex who demanded, "What?"
"The villagers weren't happy when I came looking for the Mew that lives in this forest." Ruben snorted, "And refused to hand over the girl who plays with the creature. So I smoked the girl out."
"Smoked…" Judy's head shot up and she gave him a disbelieving look. Surely he didn't mean…
"He burnt it to the ground!" Danielle squeaked.
"You burnt…" Rex growled, his Vulpix spitting fire.
"You're leaving. Now." Raven snarled, Raichu letting off sparks.
"This is no business of yours, League Trainers. Let me take the girl or you'll have Snagum, Cipher and Galactic on your tail."
Judy didn't hesitate, pulling the girl carefully to her feet and wheeling to face him. "We're League Trainers, we aren't going to surrender anyone to captivity."
"Then you're dooming yourselves. The three of you will be chased from here to Fiore and back if that's what it takes to get that Psychic in captivity." Ruben growled, sending out a Linoone to join his Mightyena.
"I won't surrender Mew." Danielle told Judy.
"We're not giving you up either." She reassured the girl, recalling her Shedinja and sending out her Delibird.
""Mightyena, Linoone, attack!"
"Vulpix Will-o-Wisp!"
"Raichu Jolt!"
Vulpix's Will-o-Wisp made Ruben's Pokémon back off and Jolt stunned his Linoone into retreating into its Pokeball.
Ruben growled. He hadn't had a proper Pokémon battle since Kayla had escaped from the labs in Orre and disappeared through a space rift when he'd finally caught up with the Hoenn League Champion at Eterna City and that had been three weeks ago and these brats weren't going to make his job easy.
"Flamethrower!" Rex ordered, his Vulpix responding rapidly.
"Crunch!" Ruben snapped back, his Mightyena trying to get his teeth into Vulpix.
"Ice Beam!" Judy told Delibird, who hit the black canine with a beam of ice, freezing it rock solid.
Ruben recalled his Bite Pokémon and glowered at them. "I'll be back! With greater numbers! That Psychic will be under our control and you won't stop us!" He snarled and retreated.
Danielle looked at them as Raven bolted after him and Rex swore vividly, kicking a tree, before swearing again and hopping around.
Judy just facepalmed.
"Judy," Raven commented when he returned to the group of three and they started heading back to the younger Trainers, "What are we going to do about…"
"What's wrong?" Danielle asked.
"We were heading for Brunswick village with a bunch of Trainers, hoping to have somewhere we could rest but…"
"Brunswick's gone…" Danielle nodded sadly, thinking, "But I do know somewhere we can hide… if you're willing to have me in your group…"
"I told you I wouldn't let him get you." Judy smiled, "Where's this place?"
Danielle looked around, convincing herself that there was no one but them around and then turned back to Judy. "Have you ever heard of the Tree of World's Beginning?"
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"Tristan, what are you doing?" Kaiba demanded as he defended himself against a rather angry Tristan who had attacked for no apparent reason.
"There he is!" Kaiba made the mistake of looking away and nearly had his head taken off, as Yugi and the others arrived. Joey intercepted the attack, much to Kaiba's surprise, but Tristan escaped and backed right off.
"Why don't you kids run along?" Nesbit, who was wearing Tristan's virtual body and highly annoyed that Noa had yet to allow him to leave this virtual hell, had decided to go after Seto and Mokuba.
"Release Tristan's body!" Yugi demanded.
"I don't think so. I won this body fair and square." He attacked Kaiba again, and Joey got in the way, blocking the metal pole he'd been swinging with his Duel Disk which was left with a huge dent in it.
Seto, in the meantime, had picked up a metal bar and brandished it like a Kendo stick at Nesbit, who laughed and disarmed him far too easily.
"Nice try, Kaiba, but not good enough!" Nesbit crowed, attacking again. Seto backed off quickly, but not quickly enough and only escaped injury because a robotic monkey leapt on him.
"That's enough!" Joey complained and booted Nesbit hard, sending him crashing through a door.
Jamie darted to the door, trying to see into the dark warehouse to find out what he was up to.
"Joey, that's still…" The sounds of a motorcycle made Tea pause midrant.
Jamie yelped as Nesbit shot past her, narrowly avoiding clipping her with the handlebars, shooting past Joey and Seto and grabbing Mokuba, escaping down a tunnel with him.
"Mokuba!" Jamie yelped, already chasing the bike, hand going to her waist automatically, stopping as she realised she couldn't catch up without her Pokemon, only for Seto to shoot past on a second motorcycle.
She growled, wheeling on the others. "Nesbit's getting away!" She complained.
"If Kaiba's chasing Nesbit, then we should focus on finding Tristan's mind." Yugi looked worried.
The robot monkey that had saved Kaiba chirped, causing Yugi and the others to turn to look at it, as Jamie scouted the area for vehicles, since she knew Joey could drive.
"This is insane." She complained to Bakura as she searched, finding a pick up truck, which she searched to try and see if it had keys.
'I have to admit that the Pharaoh does get himself into interesting situations.' Bakura snorted back as she found the keys in the glove compartment.
"Interesting is one word for it." She responded in turn, starting the truck up in order to check the gas and frowning as she saw it had a full tank of petrol. "And I think Noa put this here deliberately."
"Jamie!" Joey's worried call made Jamie poke her head around the corner. "There you are." He grinned at her, "You had us worried."
"I'm fine." Jamie waved him off, with a small smile. It was nice to have people who worried about her. "Look what I found."
"What?" Joey asked curiously, turning the corner and chuckling, "I'm driving!" He got into the driver's seat without waiting for input.
Duke grumbled and clambered into the back, where he wouldn't be tempted to make comments about Joey's driving, and gave the others a hand up.
"Let's see…" Joey muttered, stalling the vehicle once, and then pulling away, heading down the tunnel Kaiba and Nesbit had gone down at a fast pace, in an attempt to catch up.
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1 Month Ago – Kanto Region, Cameron, Tree of World's Beginning
"Where's… oh…"
Judy paused in the doorway to watch Danielle play with the Mew who lived in the Tree of Beginnings and a second Mew that Judy hadn't seen before, one whose fur was a slightly darker pink.
"Mew?" The second Mew asked Danielle, waving at Judy.
"Huh?" Danielle wheeled around defensively, then relaxed as she saw who was hovering. "Hi Judy."
Judy edged into the room. It had been described as the Heart of the Tree and it had been avoided by the group so far, as somewhere special to Mew.
The room was inside the great stone trunk, but the crystals here were much larger then those which rested in odd places along the corridors and a beam of green energy reached up to the ceiling and continued on through to the upper branches.
Judy paused by the largest of the great Crystals, staring as she realised there was actually someone entombed in it.
"That's Sir Aaron." Danielle murmured, "Mew told me he was an Aura Guardian who gave his life to save Cameron from destruction during the Great War between Kanto and Johto."
"That was hundreds of years ago." Judy was shocked, "Mew was around then?"
"No, this is a different Mew." Danielle shook her head, as the darker pink Mew settled on her shoulder, "But all Mew know of those who have been picked as an ally by a Mew."
"Then why is Aaron…?"
Danielle looked at the lighter pink Mew, who darted forward and touched her hand, its eyes glowing slightly.
"When he gave his Aura to save Cameron and the Tree, the Crystal preserved him. Mew says that he'll be free once Lucario comes."
Judy nodded, feeling like she wanted to back out of the room.
"What was it you wanted?" Danielle asked after a minute or two of silence, poking the teenager in the side and making her jump.
"Huh? Oh. Could you and Mew come give us a hand please?" Judy always felt a bit daft, coming to someone ten years her junior for help, but Danielle was the only one who Mew would get the Regis that protected this tree to back down for. "Regice won't let us down to the lake, Regirock is blocking the exit to the leafless branches and Registeel is blocking off the sleeping area. We thought it might be because they don't like it when we get close to Mew, but you're here… with two Mew, not down there so please?"
Danielle sighed, "Judy this is the Mew from New Forest." She indicated the Mew on her shoulder, "My friend. The one that Snagum Grunt was chasing me over. What do you mean Registeel is blocking off the sleeping area? We deliberately picked somewhere that wouldn't matter to set up in."
"I know this, you know this, Registeel seems to disagree."
"Where's the leafless branches?" Danielle looked confused.
"Sorry, it's what the others have taken to calling those branches in that area the wind blows really hard through and no plants grow."
"Oh I know, where the Trainers with flying Pokémon exercise their Pokémon, or take off if they're going for food." Danielle nodded her understanding, "And you said Regice is blocking the main exit?"
"Uh huh, we figure someone tried to climb the tree, and, of course, since the Regis don't like it when we climb the tree even with Mew's permission, they got funny and decided no one was going anywhere."
Danielle ran a hand through her hair. It had been hard enough to get the Regis to behave in the first place. Even with Mew on her side, they hadn't wanted to let any human into the Tree and the Tree's own immune system had caused problems for the first few minutes, until Danielle and her partner had 'spoken' to the Mew that lived here.
"Did the guards see anyone?" She asked, picking up her Pokémon Egg, which couldn't be long from hatching now, and heading for the closest problem, Registeel, and trying to work out why the Regis were playing up.
Normally if they were blocking off an area it was because Mew wanted some alone time, not that that happened very often, so why today?
"No but the fog's really bad around the base of the tree and the only person whose Pokémon knows Defog went for supplies and won't be back for another couple of hours."
Danielle bit her lower lip and nodded, "Might be why. The Tree is more vulnerable when we can't see the bottom of it. I know there's that rock wall which surrounds the lake and normally stops the fog covering that bit, but if we can't get to the lake…"
Registeel hadn't moved an inch when the pair of them finally reached the sleeping area.
"Danielle, brilliant." Rex grinned as the pair of them arrived, "Could you get Registeel to move, please?"
Danielle looked amused as she and her pair of Mew turned to Registeel. The Pokémon Trainers who escorted her here were generally nice people, there were a couple who she could have done without, but generally they were helpful and friendly.
But it never failed to amuse her that they considered her the authority in everything to do with the legendary Pokémon who lived in this tree, even though the leaders of the group, Judy, Rex and Raven, were all ten years older then her, at 18.
It wasn't even like she did more then ask Mew to get the Regis to move.
Judy, Rex and Danielle watched in amusement as Mew went off on one at Registeel, who rumbled back at it for a while, before trudging off. If a golem like thing could be said to be sullen, Registeel was defiantly that.
"Thanks." Rex darted inside and the two girls headed down to the next problem.
The Tree's Mew seemed warier now though and after a brief discussion with New Forest's Mew, darted ahead of them.
"Something wrong?" Judy asked Danielle, who looked a little confused.
"Something, but I didn't catch what." She frowned. "I'm not sure if it was something about someone getting out or someone getting in."
"Mew." New Forest's Mew patted Danielle's shoulder reassuringly.
"You think we might be under attack?"
"That grunt did say he'd be back."
Judy sighed. One grunt would be easy to take down. They hadn't just been hiding over the week and a half that they'd been here. They had been training; against each other, against the Ancient Pokémon who lived at the base of the Tree, who had decided to join in once or twice.
Their numbers had grown too. Six or seven Trainers who had returned to their home town of Cameron and a group of three who had flown or rode north when Cerulean City had come under attack and, having hit the northern coast, come eastwards and run into the two flyers they had sent out to buy food, when they had stopped in Pewter City.
The tree was huge, but there were moments when she could appreciate why the Regis were objecting to people living in the Tree. They did appear to be multiplying.
Danielle shrugged when Judy didn't respond quickly, "Or it could be another messenger from the Palace. Lady Eileen has been rather good to us."
"Probably because we helped defend the castle from Team Rocket last week."
Danielle snorted, but didn't respond to that, still heading down to Regirock. Playing with the two Mew was fun, but she often got bored of staying within the interior of the great stone Tree, and she envied the Trainers, who were able to leave whenever they needed to.
The Tree's Mew was already there, talking to Regirock, who was, most decidedly, not moving from his spot.
"Mew?" Danielle asked the psychic cat Pokémon, who turned and looked at her for a moment, then darted away, leaving Regirock in the doorway to rumble discontentedly at them.
"Mew, can you find out what's wrong please?" Danielle petted the Mew on her shoulder's head and it nodded and chased after the other Mew.
"Danielle, would you please return to the Heart of the Tree?" Judy asked calmly, though her mind was already going over possible reasons for Mew to be this worried.
"Judy!" Miranda, one of the younger Trainers who currently lived here, panted, having run through the tree looking for her, "Messenger from Cameron… took them around the back way… at the meeting place…"
"Thanks Miranda." Judy nodded, leaving down the tunnel that had the shortest route to the meeting place, one of the caves deep within the tree, lit by glowing crystals and almost as defensible as the Heart.
Danielle followed, wanting to know what the Queen wanted to say to them, and was shocked to see the messenger's panicked state.
Normally when the messenger got here, they were welcomed and offered drinks and food. This time everyone was prepping for battle.
"Miss Frost." The Messenger nodded quickly, not out of disrespect but out of a need to get his message out quickly. "Lady Eileen sent me to warn you. Cameron Palace is under attack."
"From who?" Judy demanded, as she gestured to Rex and Raven to start organising teams.
"Team Galactic."
Everyone froze.
"Then they have come this far north?" Judy asked, biting her lower lip, this explained the problem with the Regis...
"I'm afraid so." The messenger nodded. "Lady Eileen asks that you don't help the palace. She will negotiate with them."
"They'll want everything the palace has. Rare Pokémon, priceless treasures…"
"Cameron Palace will survive this attack, just as they have others. Lady Eileen asks that you do not come to the palace until a message is sent saying that it is safe to do so. She apologises for this but…"
"I understand." Judy waved the messenger off. "We'll get supplies further afield for a while. Tell Lady Eileen that we will stay away, but if she needs any help, send a messenger and we'll be there as quickly as possible."
"Thank you." The messenger seemed relieved, as if he hadn't believed the Trainers would be reasonable, making Judy wonder what rumours were going around about League Trainers.
The messenger's eyes grew wide as the two Mew floated through the door and attached themselves to Danielle, pretending to whisper in her ear, their eyes glowing with a light they seemed to gain when 'talking' to the girl.
"Would you like a lift down?" Judy asked, knocking on the 'table' which consisted of a rather large stone plinth, to catch the messenger's attention.
"Yes, please." He nodded, watching for a little longer until Julian, one of the pair of Trainers with a team based on Flying types, escorted him out.
"We'd be highly applicative if you could avoid talking about the Mew in front of anyone who might gain an interest in capturing them." Julian said as they reached one of the upper, open branches, on the opposite side of the Tree to the leafless branches and sent out his Charizard.
"I will." The messenger nodded. "Could you drop me off at the bottom of the canyon? The fog's thick enough that no one will see you."
"No problem." Julian nodded, happy to get out for a while, giving the messenger, who couldn't have been very old, maybe old enough to leave if he'd wanted to become a Trainer, but no older, a hand up, as Charizard waited patiently.
"Okay Charizard, let's make this quick." Julian patted his Pokémon's neck.
Charizard leapt off of the stone branch and dove straight down, straightening out too late for his poor Trainer, who by this point had been deafened by the messenger's terrified scream.
He rubbed his ears and grimaced over his shoulder at the guy, who looked half apologetic and half like he was going to hurl. "Sorry."
"It's alright, I tend to forget that there aren't that many people who are used to Charizard's stunts." Julian chuckled, sending Charizard down into the fog, slowly, to try to find somewhere to land.
Unfortunately they were so intent on watching where they were going, that they missed the sound of the incoming Ice Beam until it was too late to dodge.
Charizard tried his best, managing to move enough for the attack to only strike a wing, but when the wing froze, he was unable to fly and the three of them crash landed.
Julian was on his feet in an instant, recalling his Charizard for its own protection and sending out his Pidgeot. "Go." He growled at the messenger, who nodded and ran for it. "Come out here and fight me with honour." Julian growled into the fog.
A laugh echoed around him, seeming to come from all directions at once. "I don't think so." The voice replied, "Surrender now and we'll let you release your Pokémon."
"I don't believe you." Julian shouted back, grimacing as the only reply he got was an Ice Beam which only narrowly missed his foot.
"It's either that or we do this the hard way." The voice replied, Julian scowled, wondering how the thug's attacks were so accurate. A Pokémon like a Glaceon perhaps, with heat sensitive eyes… "Where are the resistance hiding?"
"We're not Resistance." Julian protested.
"If you stand against Galactic, you're resistance, now where are the others."
"Like I'd tell you." He let out a startled cry as an Ice Beam struck his foot, freezing the bottom part of his leg, encasing it in a covering of ice that clung to the floor.
"Where are the resistance?" The voice repeated.
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Noa was unsure whether he was happy with the latest turn of events or not.
He'd been trying to work out what part of the code for Yugi and Jamie's mental data allowed two others to piggyback into his server, and if he could manipulate it, when he'd found out Nesbit had kidnapped Mokuba.
This wasn't acceptable.
Not only was Nesbit running around in a body that didn't belong to him, but kidnapping Mokuba was not part of the plan, even if it had lured Kaiba directly to Lector.
Now he had Mokuba in his grasp, and even as he weaved lies about his brother to the youngest Kaiba brother, he was manipulating Mokuba's mental data, making him more susceptible to suggestion, more believing, wreaking the trust in Seto…
And it was good practise.
Working on a mind that only had data for one person, allowed him to compare it against one with two, and that, in turn helped him with the problem of three minds in one body or avatar.
By the time Seto had finished his match, with the, oh so predictable, outcome of Lector exploding into tiny pieces, and Noa had finished the set up with Mokuba, finishing up with a Seto recreated completely from data, who denied ever wanting to see Mokuba again, breaking Mokuba just enough that the new data took a hold, putting Mokuba under his command, he had a program complied and ready to execute the moment the conditions were right.
There was a moment of guilt, when Mokuba repeated his lie about him being the only one he could trust, but it was washed away quickly, by the thrill of success.
He taunted Kaiba, luring him into following the path Noa had put before him, and was amused when Yugi and Tea followed him.
With the manipulation of just two strings of code, the party was split up again, Seto was alone, Yugi and Tea were minutes behind him, and Joey, Jamie, Serenity, Duke and the monkey formally known as Tristan, were still on the bridge.
No matter how complicated the situation was getting, Noa was Gozabora Kaiba's real son and he would prove himself better then Seto.
With the manipulation of another, Seto was falling, coming to him, falling straight into Noa's trap.
And Mokuba was the perfect bait.
"Thanks for dropping in Seto."
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"I don't like this, I don't like this at all." Jamie muttered angrily as she paced the place where the tunnel had disappeared, taking Seto, Tea and Yugi with it.
"So what? Are we expected to just wait here for them to get back?" Duke demanded, frustrated.
"Uh guys?" Jamie looked over her shoulder to where the robot monkey supposedly hosting Tristan's mind, was panicking, "You might want to look at this."
She trudged over cautiously, still not trusting the monkey one hundred percent, though it acted and sounded like Tristan, or at least it did now that the switch had been flipped, but if there actually was something down there…
Something shot out of the water, causing her to back up.
"Four of the big five!" Joey yelped. "We beat you fair and square."
"But we still have some unfinished business." Gansley sounded far too amused.
'Jamie!' Bakura snarled, having already worked out what was about to happen.
"I know, I know!" Jamie replied, realising what Bakura was on about second before Gansley leapt forward to seize a body. "'Kura!" Jamie let out a frightened squeak.
They swapped, Bakura reaching for the Duel Disk which seemed permanently attached to which ever 'user' was currently using the account, and summoning two monsters, both foxes, who joined Joey's beasts in the sky.
They leapt into the truck as the humans posing as Duel Monsters got into battle with the monsters, Joey, thankfully not saying anything as Bakura clambered in behind Duke, keeping the Big Five members at bay as Joey got the engine started.
"Wheeler!" Bakura snarled, "What's taking so long?"
"If you can do any better…" Joey started growling, only to be cut off when the engine finally kicked in.
"Go!" Bakura kicked the van and Joey put his foot down, sending the two in the back toppling over.
Pushing himself upright, Bakura snarled something rather rude about Joey and his inability to do anything right, then reached for another card, only to find that his deck now consisted of three cards and none of them were monsters.
'That damn maze!' Bakura snarled, cursing Noa and whoever had spawned Noa and everyone ever related to Noa ever.
Duke had 'helpfully' decided to stand up rather then stay knelt, and as such couldn't do anything useful as he had to hold on tight to the rails in order to avoid falling out of the truck as they reached the end of the bridge and headed into the mountains.
"They're gaining on us!" Joey yelped.
"Then drive faster!" Bakura snapped back.
"It won't go any faster!" Joey snarled back.
Judge Man got ahead of them, then Nightmare Penguin and while Joey was dodging those, Jinzo fired on the truck, which had already been straining from taking the turns too sharply at too high a speed, and when hit rolled over, leaving Bakura and Duke in the dust and Joey and Serenity dazed and confused in the truck's cabin.
Joey pulled himself out first, helping Serenity up, "Duke? Bakura?"
"I'm ok." Duke murmured as Bakura gave Joey an amused glance. Since when had Joey had that much concern for him?
Jamie appeared at his side and nudged, "Let me take over."
'It's not safe.'
"We're caught." Jamie's tone was… accepting, "Hopefully the Ring will protect us, like it did before."
'Are you sure?'
"No more then I have been since Battle City started."
Bakura snorted and let her switch with him, just in time for her to be grabbed by her collar and dumped over by the truck, with slightly more dignity then Duke who was simply flung at it by Judge Man.
"Four bodies, one each." Crump sounded amused.
"Not happening." Jamie shook her head, getting to her feet, "You haven't won our bodies, your boss is going to be annoyed, to put it mildly, if you seize ours." She smirked.
Duke wondered if this was more of her acting, like when she'd threatened the goons yesterday, while Joey wondered what the point of Bakura switching with Jamie was if he was going to talk through her anyway.
"We'll have escaped long before Noa finds out!" Crump leapt at her only to be knocked back by a bright light.
Noa stood between the Duel Monsters and the humans. "Want to bet?" He demanded.
"Noa!" Crump backed away quickly.
"I gave you all the chance to win your freedom and you failed. Now you'll pay the price."
Joey and Serenity ducked back into the cabin and Duke seized a hold of the railings he'd been clinging to with one hand, while grabbing Jamie's and pulling her in until she could grab a hold herself, with the other as a tornado swept away the Duel Monsters.
"Gentlemen," Noa continued as the tornado vanished, "You're dismissed. No one breaks my rules and gets away with it!" He, however, didn't vanish with the Duel Monsters, instead turning to look at those assembled.
"They're not the only ones breaking rules here." He looked at Jamie. "Three against on one isn't within the rules."
"There is no rule against being possessed within the game of Duel Monsters either, Noa." Jamie scowled back, "And there are only two of us in here." She tapped her head.
"Still I believe a re-match is in order." Noa replied, snorting his disbelief at her attempt at duplicity. He knew there were three of them in there, he had the data proving it, "On your own, without the help of the others within you."
"Any time, any place, Noa." Jamie nodded, "But this time, when I win, you're going to release everyone you've trapped in this virtual hell, got it?"
"Agreed. Once I've dealt with the Big Five, I'll return and you'd better be ready."
"I will be."
Noa vanished.
"Are you crazy?" Joey demanded, wheeling on her instantly.
"No." Jamie snorted, midnight blue eyes glinting, a smirk gracing her features. "I took Noa down easily last time. I'm not worried now."
"Yeah, when you had Bakura in your head! You heard him, you won't be allowed to ask for help this time!"
"So what? I need someone in my head guiding me?" Jamie glowered at Joey, "I'll do perfectly fine without him, thank you very much."
"Joey… Yugi's possessed too, isn't he?" Duke asked hesitantly.
"Yes…" Joey admitted slowly. "Oh… oh no…"
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Present – Kanto Region, Cameron, Tree of World's Beginning.
They had defended the Tree of World's Beginning for just under a month now but it was over.
A few hours ago the Tree of Beginning had come under a renewed attack from both Team Cypher and Team Galactic, still high on their victory at the Indigo Plateau, the home place of the Pokémon League, which was now little more then rubble and ashes, and while the Trainers, the Tree and it's guardians had fought back, there was little left that they could do.
The Tree of Beginnings was dying.
It's immune system was destroyed, the gems that had grown here ripped out, the Regis captured by Cypher to add to their collection of Shadow Legendary Pokémon, to go with Lugia, Suicune, Raikou and Entai as well as allow them to awaken Regigigas, the Pokémon who had apparently towed the continents when the world had been formed, the ancient Pokémon who had lived at the base of the tree fled or captured…
The Mew that had invited them into their home was dying alongside the tree...
They had been pushed back to the Heart of the Tree, where the last of the crystals stood, encasing the Aura Guardian, Sir Aaron, who had died hundreds of years ago, trying to make their final stand, but even if they repelled Galactic now, the tree would die because there was no Aura Guardian among them to give their aura to save it.
Even Danielle, who had Mew in her arms, the little pink cat too weak to float any more, and had called on the Mew of New Forest to come and help, was unable to do anything to save the tree.
"It's all over." The grunts who were facing them smirked, "Surrender now and we might consider letting you go."
"Liar!" Danielle snapped, making Raven look over his shoulder at her for just a moment.
Her eyes glowing pink as she glowered at the grunts, the Mew from New Forest teleporting to her side and looking at her quickly before sending the Grunts sprawling.
"Mew, mewewew." It demanded of the others, taking Danielle's hand, dragging her away from the crystals and the other Trainers.
Danielle's eyes widened as Mew started glowing, "Run!" She told the others, panic clear, "Galactic are going to Rend the tree!"
"What?" The youngest of the Trainers yelped.
"Run!" Danielle begged them and then she was gone, teleported away.
The Trainers fled, heading down and out, escaping out onto the branches and giving those without flying Pokémon lifts out of there.
Judy, who had been captured with a group of four, when they'd tried to free the Regis, watched in horror as Danielle appeared out of nowhere, one Mew in her arms, another by her side, teleporting directly into the group of several New Species Pokémon that had arrived just moments ago, teleporting in from different forests and lakes, only to be caught up in the Spacial Rend that Palkia tore in reality, which sucked up Danielle, the collection of Mew, the Tree and every single Pokémon or Trainer who hadn't managed to escape.
"NO!" Judy bellowed, trying to pull out of the arms of her captors, scared for all those still in the tree, succeeding but unable to do anything to save her friends.
"Was that really necessary?" Evice complained at Saturn, "You just sent six Mew through the Rend to the Otherworld. Do you have any idea how rare those things are? If I'd known so many Mew lived here, I'd have had you bring one in!"
"We had no idea there was anything more of value in that tree. As far as we were aware there was nothing left worth saving."
"An understandable mistake, resistance members are a dozen a poke-dollar." Evice shrugged, "The dirt on my shoes is worth more then…" He cut off when Judy snapped, going to attack him, only to be knocked down by Mars, a fellow commander.
She glowered at him from her place on the floor.
Mars, the second youngest of the Galactic Admins smirked at her. "If you don't mind, Charon's been riding me for weeks about getting a hold of a couple of Trainers who'd been exposed to Aura and that Tree was soaked in the stuff…"
"Go ahead. We have no use for them." Evice snorted, "Unless one of them turns out PKNE positive."
"Give the PKNEs to you, so they can escape like that fire girl?" Mars snorted.
"We have an agreement." Evice glowered.
"Indeed we do." Saturn scowled at Mars, who backed down only because Palkia was under his command, "We'll test them but I doubt there are any PKNEs among this lot. It was only a small group."
"Be careful with that!" Evice's attention was drawn away by a loud crash as the cage containing an unconscious Aerodactyl was knocked over. "Excuse me…" He stalked off.
"How much longer do we have to put up with them?" Mars growled, as she gestured to two Galactic Grunts, who dragged Judy to her feet and chucked her in with the other, captured Trainers.
"Not long now. We just need Dialga."
"Shouldn't Mercury have recovered it by now?"
"She should but…" Saturn's tone revealed his distaste for his colleague.
"You don't think she's up to the task?" Mars asked, intrigued, having never heard Saturn mention anything about the other admins before.
"I think someone with a little more experience and a lot longer fuse should be running the Otherworld Team." He scowled.
"It's not like there's any real resistance. There aren't any Trainers in the Otherworld."
"Only the ones we've sent there and the few who have spent far too much time with Francis." Saturn replied, pausing in the conversation to direct the Grunts to their assigned tasks.
"Francis? She's still a problem?" Mars was surprised. She knew Trainers could be difficult but… "How is she…?"
"At this point, her interference is an example of how inept Mercury is." Saturn scowled, "Any other admin would have dealt with her by now."
Mars paused, thought for a moment, then smirked. "How dangerous are Francis and her Trainers?"
"If they don't get their hands on Dialga, there's no problem."
"And if they do?"
"There's several ways it could go."
"Send me; I'll get the job done." Mars told him, without any hint of doubt in her mind. "By the time I'm finished, Francis and her group won't be a problem."
"How many Grunts will you need?" At this point, Saturn was willing to send her, if only to stop Mercury whining about having to focus on searching for the Master Ball rather then invading the Domino Day Care and seizing back their Pokémon, or hunting down their targets.
"Just the six I've trained personally." Mars replied with a grin that showed her sharp canines.
"That's all?"
"That's all I'll need."
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"We can help you save Mokuba!" Tea protested as Kaiba tried to leave, "He's our friend too!"
Kaiba snorted, "I can handle Noa. If I were you I'd worry about him." He gestured towards one of the great stone plinths in the area.
Yugi turned to look, "Nesbit!"
Nesbit, still wearing Tristan's body laughed at them. "Yes and it's not just me in here!"
"We're all using this body, and between the five of us, we'll crush you." Crump crowed.
"If you want your friend's body back, you'll duel us." It was Lector's turn now and he addressed Yugi directly.
"Five on one isn't fair." Joey protested, as Yugi stepped forward, ready to accept the challenge.
"It isn't only Yugi we're challenging." Lector gave him a look that clearly stated that he'd missed something.
"We're challenging everyone who shares their avatar with another." Johnson was out now. "So that includes you, Francis."
Jamie's midnight blue eyes flickered to Yugi, who nodded at her calmly and switched with Yami.
"That still only totals four." Joey scowled. "So you can count me in. That puts the total at five on five."
"You sure about this Joey?" Yami asked, concerned.
"Fine." Johnson sounded amused, "But since its three bodies against one, we'll start with twelve thousand life points while you three start with four thousand."
"Are you five ready to lose?" Gansley demanded.
"No." Joey snorted, already beginning to have trouble keeping up with who was in charge of Tristan's body, which they seemed to be playing musical chairs with, "Cause you're the ones going down." Joey's disk activated last and the cards started scrolling past.
'Pick your cards carefully and remember what I said about…' Bakura started.
"I know, I don't need your help here." Jamie cut him off, "I know what I'm doing." She picked her deck out and chose Kitsune Maiden as her Deck Master again.
Yami nodded approvingly and chose the Dark Magician.
Joey snorted, completely unsurprised by Yugi's choice and also made the obvious choice of the Flame Swordsman.
"Now then…" The Big Five's total climbed to a depressing total of twelve thousand, "It's time to Duel!"
Joey would have vaulted the railings, despite the long drop, if his sister hadn't been in the middle of a Duel.
"Joey?" Serenity wheeled around at Joey's desperate call. "Joey, is that really you?"
"Yeah, I'm here." Joey nodded, giving his sister a reassuring smile.
"Where's Tristan?" Tea called down, as Yugi tried to read the duel, realising that, if it wasn't for Perfect Machine King, Serenity and Duke would have the advantage, "Wasn't he with you?"
The way Duke's shoulders sank and Serenity teared up told Jamie what she needed to know, even as Duke confirmed it. "He's gone. Tristan fell."
"What?" Tea gasped.
"Tristan lost the duel." Duke replied.
"He was protecting me." Serenity sounded miserable.
Duke was irritated by Tristan's actions. Yes Nesbit had been focusing on Serenity, but she'd known the basics well enough to put up a decent defence so far. If Tristan had thought about what was going on, instead of being determined to take all the damage aimed at Serenity himself, there was a good chance that all three of them would still be in the game.
"But that means… oh no…" Tea sank to her knees, Yugi gripped the railing tightly and Joey scowled.
"Make room, I'm joining in." Joey said, preparing to vault the railings and jump down to the metal crates below.
"Negative." Nesbit rumbled, "Interference will not be allowed. The duel will continue."
Jamie watched Joey give his sister reassurance, recognising both the confidence he was trying to project to his sister, and the helpless feeling that was hidden underneath.
She knew how that felt, knowing that your little sister was in danger and being unable to do much about it.
A memory flashed past, of baiting the Admin in charge of the Magma grunts who had overrun her home town into a three on three Pokémon battle, knowing full well that she only had one Pokémon left to battle with, knowing that if her Marshtomp fainted, she would lose the battle and there would be nothing she could do, knowing that if she failed, her life and the lives of her sister and her sister's friends would be forfeit...
'You have a sister?'
Bakura's voice shocked her out of the fear filled memories of the battle, just in time to watch Serenity's Saint Joan defeat Perfect Machine King and win the duel.
"Just one. My little sister, Lizzie. She's a Pokémon Trainer, like me." She sensed Bakura's amusement at the pride in her mental 'voice'. "Been travelling for a year and a bit now."
'You never mentioned her.'
"You never mentioned your family either." Jamie replied, watching Joey hug his sister, unable to help the pang of jealousy that made her heart ache. "It hurts to talk about her."
Bakura understood that all too well. Even now, five thousand years down the line, he didn't like talking about his family.
Jamie reached the bottom step in time to hear Duke ask, "So what's the plan?"
"The enemy would have escaped into Tristan's body by now." She said, causing everyone to look at her, "But his mind will be in this virtual world somewhere."
"That's true." Yugi nodded, thinking. "We just have to find it."
"But how are we going to find him?" Duke demanded, "He could be anywhere, and Noa's not exactly going to make this easy!"
'They're forgetting that without a body, Tristan won't be able to return to the human world.' Bakura reminded her, trying not to be too amused by the situation.
"You have a point." Jamie muttered, catching Yugi's attention.
"Bakura have something to say?" He asked, causing Serenity and Duke to stare at her, as if seeing the Ring hanging around her neck for the first time.
"Finding his mind's all well and good, but he has no body to return to, unless you plan on sharing with him."
"I'm not sharing." Duke shook his head violently.
"I do have one idea. We split into two groups." Jamie said, thinking carefully. "One looks for Tristan's mind, the other tries to hunt down the bad guy…"
"Nesbit." Duke interrupted.
"…Tries to hunt down Nesbit. See if he's still in the virtual world."
"We're not splitting up again." Joey growled.
"Then what's your plan?"
"We find Tristan's mind, then we hunt down Noa and shake him upside down until he lets us out of here."
"That doesn't solve the issue of Tristan not having a body." She reminded him.
"Splitting up isn't a good idea." Jamie scowled as she realised who was out. The Pharaoh looked thoughtful as he continued. "But there may be another way."
"Do tell, Pharaoh." Joey gave her a sharp look when her tone sounded slightly hostile, noting that her eyes were darker, and there were lighter streaks in her hair. Had Bakura spoken through her for a moment?
"We challenge Noa. Nesbit didn't win the duel, so he should have freed Tristan. Considering his addiction to sticking to the rules, there's a chance that, if we beat Noa, he'll let us all go. Tristan included."
"Might work." Jamie acknowledged.
"Yugi no!" Tea protested. "If you challenge Noa, he'll try and steal your body!"
"He'll only take it if I lose." Yami reminded her.
"That's not strictly true." Jamie shook her head, wanting to warn them for Yugi's sake, rather then Yami's, "I've fought him once already. He tried to steal my body after I won. He only failed because of…" She indicated the Millennium Ring.
"So much for sticking to the rules." Joey snorted.
"So what? We just let them get away with it?" Duke demanded.
"No." Yugi was out again and he was thinking. "Let's find Tristan's mind, then we'll deal with Noa."
"What about Nesbit?"
'The problem would be solved if he ran into Marik.'
Jamie snorted, acknowledging Bakura's point. "We've beat Noa once. Let us try."
"I dunno…" Joey looked wary for a moment and Jamie felt insulted until she realised that he was worried about Bakura pulling something.
"Fine…" Jamie scowled. "Noa I know you're watching, you Muk! I want a word!" She bellowed. "You're breaking your word. You said you'd free me when I found my friends."
Noa, scowling at her accusation of duplicity, appeared on the balcony they had arrived at. "You're missing one." He pointed out.
"Where's Tristan?" She demanded. "Nesbit had no right to take control of his body."
"Oh don't you worry." Noa smirked, "I haven't freed Nesbit yet, he's still in here. He didn't earn the right to take that body."
"So both Nesbit and Tristan are still in the virtual world?"
"That's correct." Noa nodded. "Have fun looking." He vanished.
"You were going to leave us behind?" Joey wheeled on her.
"No. Actually I got the information we needed without anyone being left on the outside with Marik." Jamie snorted back at him. "Nesbit's still in this virtual world, which means there's a chance we can force him to give up his claim on Tristan."
"So all we have to do is find Tristan and Nesbit and we're set." Duke nodded.
"Well played." Yugi smiled at her.
"Thanks Yugi." Jamie nodded back, "Shall we?" She gestured towards a door on the right hand side.
"Let's go."
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1 Month 2 Weeks Ago – Kanto Region, New Forest
They were a group of ten to fifteen Trainers of varying ages, ranging from Judy, Rex and Raven, who were the oldest at 17, to Gillian, the youngest at 10, who had only left on her journey a few days before Viridian had given itself up to the invaders from Team Galactic and forced out any League sympathisers.
They'd been travelling for a couple of weeks now, heading north, having passed through Pewter City, and were now just north of Mt Moon, hoping to settle in Brunswick Village, which was full of history, but didn't have anything like a Gym or a Pokémon Lab to attract the bad guys.
"LEAVE ME ALONE!" A child's scream caused everyone in the small, temporary camp to freeze.
"Rex, Raven!" Judy demanded, already on her feet and moving towards the sound when the two boys shook off the shock and got to their feet.
She darted through the trees, sending out her Shedinja, who moved much faster then she could, the Bug/Ghost type unhampered by the need to go around trees, and by the time she'd caught up, it was floating between an injured girl, who was clutching a Pokémon Egg close to her chest and couldn't be more then six or seven, and a Mightyena obviously belonging to the huge thug that glowered at her on her arrival.
"Stay out of this. That girl is property of Team Cipher." He snarled at her.
"No I'm not!" The pink haired girl protested shakily, "I don't belong to anyone!"
Judy moved behind her Shedinja as the two boys burst into the area, going to the girl's side as Rex's Vulpix and Raven's Raichu joined her Shed Pokémon.
"Who's the creep?" Rex asked confidently, deliberately smirked, antagonising the thug into focusing on him rather then the girls, not that Judy wasn't a good Trainer, but he'd rather she dealt with the girl, and he dealt with the bad guy. He was bad at dealing with children under ten.
"I'm Ruben, of Team Snagum." The thug sounded all too happy about that, "Get out of my way."
"No." Raven replied, glowering. He'd heard of Team Snagum, even before the League had let Galactic capture Palkia. He'd fought alongside his good friend, Iason, in the last civil war against Team Cipher in their home lands of Orre, and where there was Cipher, there was often Snagum.
"I'm Judy Frost, of Shamuti Island. I'm a League Trainer." She smiled softly at the girl, "I won't let him lay a hand on you." She offered the girl a hand up.
The girl hesitated, but then took her hand. Judy felt a presence touch her mind, like that of Slowking's or Jynx's when they spoke mind to mind with her, then it was gone. The girl's pensive look turned to a real smile, "I'm Danielle Rouge, of Brunswick Village…" She looked at the floor, "Or… I was… I have no where now…"
Ruben's smirk irked Rex who demanded, "What?"
"The villagers weren't happy when I came looking for the Mew that lives in this forest." Ruben snorted, "And refused to hand over the girl who plays with the creature. So I smoked the girl out."
"Smoked…" Judy's head shot up and she gave him a disbelieving look. Surely he didn't mean…
"He burnt it to the ground!" Danielle squeaked.
"You burnt…" Rex growled, his Vulpix spitting fire.
"You're leaving. Now." Raven snarled, Raichu letting off sparks.
"This is no business of yours, League Trainers. Let me take the girl or you'll have Snagum, Cipher and Galactic on your tail."
Judy didn't hesitate, pulling the girl carefully to her feet and wheeling to face him. "We're League Trainers, we aren't going to surrender anyone to captivity."
"Then you're dooming yourselves. The three of you will be chased from here to Fiore and back if that's what it takes to get that Psychic in captivity." Ruben growled, sending out a Linoone to join his Mightyena.
"I won't surrender Mew." Danielle told Judy.
"We're not giving you up either." She reassured the girl, recalling her Shedinja and sending out her Delibird.
""Mightyena, Linoone, attack!"
"Vulpix Will-o-Wisp!"
"Raichu Jolt!"
Vulpix's Will-o-Wisp made Ruben's Pokémon back off and Jolt stunned his Linoone into retreating into its Pokeball.
Ruben growled. He hadn't had a proper Pokémon battle since Kayla had escaped from the labs in Orre and disappeared through a space rift when he'd finally caught up with the Hoenn League Champion at Eterna City and that had been three weeks ago and these brats weren't going to make his job easy.
"Flamethrower!" Rex ordered, his Vulpix responding rapidly.
"Crunch!" Ruben snapped back, his Mightyena trying to get his teeth into Vulpix.
"Ice Beam!" Judy told Delibird, who hit the black canine with a beam of ice, freezing it rock solid.
Ruben recalled his Bite Pokémon and glowered at them. "I'll be back! With greater numbers! That Psychic will be under our control and you won't stop us!" He snarled and retreated.
Danielle looked at them as Raven bolted after him and Rex swore vividly, kicking a tree, before swearing again and hopping around.
Judy just facepalmed.
"Judy," Raven commented when he returned to the group of three and they started heading back to the younger Trainers, "What are we going to do about…"
"What's wrong?" Danielle asked.
"We were heading for Brunswick village with a bunch of Trainers, hoping to have somewhere we could rest but…"
"Brunswick's gone…" Danielle nodded sadly, thinking, "But I do know somewhere we can hide… if you're willing to have me in your group…"
"I told you I wouldn't let him get you." Judy smiled, "Where's this place?"
Danielle looked around, convincing herself that there was no one but them around and then turned back to Judy. "Have you ever heard of the Tree of World's Beginning?"
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"Tristan, what are you doing?" Kaiba demanded as he defended himself against a rather angry Tristan who had attacked for no apparent reason.
"There he is!" Kaiba made the mistake of looking away and nearly had his head taken off, as Yugi and the others arrived. Joey intercepted the attack, much to Kaiba's surprise, but Tristan escaped and backed right off.
"Why don't you kids run along?" Nesbit, who was wearing Tristan's virtual body and highly annoyed that Noa had yet to allow him to leave this virtual hell, had decided to go after Seto and Mokuba.
"Release Tristan's body!" Yugi demanded.
"I don't think so. I won this body fair and square." He attacked Kaiba again, and Joey got in the way, blocking the metal pole he'd been swinging with his Duel Disk which was left with a huge dent in it.
Seto, in the meantime, had picked up a metal bar and brandished it like a Kendo stick at Nesbit, who laughed and disarmed him far too easily.
"Nice try, Kaiba, but not good enough!" Nesbit crowed, attacking again. Seto backed off quickly, but not quickly enough and only escaped injury because a robotic monkey leapt on him.
"That's enough!" Joey complained and booted Nesbit hard, sending him crashing through a door.
Jamie darted to the door, trying to see into the dark warehouse to find out what he was up to.
"Joey, that's still…" The sounds of a motorcycle made Tea pause midrant.
Jamie yelped as Nesbit shot past her, narrowly avoiding clipping her with the handlebars, shooting past Joey and Seto and grabbing Mokuba, escaping down a tunnel with him.
"Mokuba!" Jamie yelped, already chasing the bike, hand going to her waist automatically, stopping as she realised she couldn't catch up without her Pokemon, only for Seto to shoot past on a second motorcycle.
She growled, wheeling on the others. "Nesbit's getting away!" She complained.
"If Kaiba's chasing Nesbit, then we should focus on finding Tristan's mind." Yugi looked worried.
The robot monkey that had saved Kaiba chirped, causing Yugi and the others to turn to look at it, as Jamie scouted the area for vehicles, since she knew Joey could drive.
"This is insane." She complained to Bakura as she searched, finding a pick up truck, which she searched to try and see if it had keys.
'I have to admit that the Pharaoh does get himself into interesting situations.' Bakura snorted back as she found the keys in the glove compartment.
"Interesting is one word for it." She responded in turn, starting the truck up in order to check the gas and frowning as she saw it had a full tank of petrol. "And I think Noa put this here deliberately."
"Jamie!" Joey's worried call made Jamie poke her head around the corner. "There you are." He grinned at her, "You had us worried."
"I'm fine." Jamie waved him off, with a small smile. It was nice to have people who worried about her. "Look what I found."
"What?" Joey asked curiously, turning the corner and chuckling, "I'm driving!" He got into the driver's seat without waiting for input.
Duke grumbled and clambered into the back, where he wouldn't be tempted to make comments about Joey's driving, and gave the others a hand up.
"Let's see…" Joey muttered, stalling the vehicle once, and then pulling away, heading down the tunnel Kaiba and Nesbit had gone down at a fast pace, in an attempt to catch up.
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1 Month Ago – Kanto Region, Cameron, Tree of World's Beginning
"Where's… oh…"
Judy paused in the doorway to watch Danielle play with the Mew who lived in the Tree of Beginnings and a second Mew that Judy hadn't seen before, one whose fur was a slightly darker pink.
"Mew?" The second Mew asked Danielle, waving at Judy.
"Huh?" Danielle wheeled around defensively, then relaxed as she saw who was hovering. "Hi Judy."
Judy edged into the room. It had been described as the Heart of the Tree and it had been avoided by the group so far, as somewhere special to Mew.
The room was inside the great stone trunk, but the crystals here were much larger then those which rested in odd places along the corridors and a beam of green energy reached up to the ceiling and continued on through to the upper branches.
Judy paused by the largest of the great Crystals, staring as she realised there was actually someone entombed in it.
"That's Sir Aaron." Danielle murmured, "Mew told me he was an Aura Guardian who gave his life to save Cameron from destruction during the Great War between Kanto and Johto."
"That was hundreds of years ago." Judy was shocked, "Mew was around then?"
"No, this is a different Mew." Danielle shook her head, as the darker pink Mew settled on her shoulder, "But all Mew know of those who have been picked as an ally by a Mew."
"Then why is Aaron…?"
Danielle looked at the lighter pink Mew, who darted forward and touched her hand, its eyes glowing slightly.
"When he gave his Aura to save Cameron and the Tree, the Crystal preserved him. Mew says that he'll be free once Lucario comes."
Judy nodded, feeling like she wanted to back out of the room.
"What was it you wanted?" Danielle asked after a minute or two of silence, poking the teenager in the side and making her jump.
"Huh? Oh. Could you and Mew come give us a hand please?" Judy always felt a bit daft, coming to someone ten years her junior for help, but Danielle was the only one who Mew would get the Regis that protected this tree to back down for. "Regice won't let us down to the lake, Regirock is blocking the exit to the leafless branches and Registeel is blocking off the sleeping area. We thought it might be because they don't like it when we get close to Mew, but you're here… with two Mew, not down there so please?"
Danielle sighed, "Judy this is the Mew from New Forest." She indicated the Mew on her shoulder, "My friend. The one that Snagum Grunt was chasing me over. What do you mean Registeel is blocking off the sleeping area? We deliberately picked somewhere that wouldn't matter to set up in."
"I know this, you know this, Registeel seems to disagree."
"Where's the leafless branches?" Danielle looked confused.
"Sorry, it's what the others have taken to calling those branches in that area the wind blows really hard through and no plants grow."
"Oh I know, where the Trainers with flying Pokémon exercise their Pokémon, or take off if they're going for food." Danielle nodded her understanding, "And you said Regice is blocking the main exit?"
"Uh huh, we figure someone tried to climb the tree, and, of course, since the Regis don't like it when we climb the tree even with Mew's permission, they got funny and decided no one was going anywhere."
Danielle ran a hand through her hair. It had been hard enough to get the Regis to behave in the first place. Even with Mew on her side, they hadn't wanted to let any human into the Tree and the Tree's own immune system had caused problems for the first few minutes, until Danielle and her partner had 'spoken' to the Mew that lived here.
"Did the guards see anyone?" She asked, picking up her Pokémon Egg, which couldn't be long from hatching now, and heading for the closest problem, Registeel, and trying to work out why the Regis were playing up.
Normally if they were blocking off an area it was because Mew wanted some alone time, not that that happened very often, so why today?
"No but the fog's really bad around the base of the tree and the only person whose Pokémon knows Defog went for supplies and won't be back for another couple of hours."
Danielle bit her lower lip and nodded, "Might be why. The Tree is more vulnerable when we can't see the bottom of it. I know there's that rock wall which surrounds the lake and normally stops the fog covering that bit, but if we can't get to the lake…"
Registeel hadn't moved an inch when the pair of them finally reached the sleeping area.
"Danielle, brilliant." Rex grinned as the pair of them arrived, "Could you get Registeel to move, please?"
Danielle looked amused as she and her pair of Mew turned to Registeel. The Pokémon Trainers who escorted her here were generally nice people, there were a couple who she could have done without, but generally they were helpful and friendly.
But it never failed to amuse her that they considered her the authority in everything to do with the legendary Pokémon who lived in this tree, even though the leaders of the group, Judy, Rex and Raven, were all ten years older then her, at 18.
It wasn't even like she did more then ask Mew to get the Regis to move.
Judy, Rex and Danielle watched in amusement as Mew went off on one at Registeel, who rumbled back at it for a while, before trudging off. If a golem like thing could be said to be sullen, Registeel was defiantly that.
"Thanks." Rex darted inside and the two girls headed down to the next problem.
The Tree's Mew seemed warier now though and after a brief discussion with New Forest's Mew, darted ahead of them.
"Something wrong?" Judy asked Danielle, who looked a little confused.
"Something, but I didn't catch what." She frowned. "I'm not sure if it was something about someone getting out or someone getting in."
"Mew." New Forest's Mew patted Danielle's shoulder reassuringly.
"You think we might be under attack?"
"That grunt did say he'd be back."
Judy sighed. One grunt would be easy to take down. They hadn't just been hiding over the week and a half that they'd been here. They had been training; against each other, against the Ancient Pokémon who lived at the base of the Tree, who had decided to join in once or twice.
Their numbers had grown too. Six or seven Trainers who had returned to their home town of Cameron and a group of three who had flown or rode north when Cerulean City had come under attack and, having hit the northern coast, come eastwards and run into the two flyers they had sent out to buy food, when they had stopped in Pewter City.
The tree was huge, but there were moments when she could appreciate why the Regis were objecting to people living in the Tree. They did appear to be multiplying.
Danielle shrugged when Judy didn't respond quickly, "Or it could be another messenger from the Palace. Lady Eileen has been rather good to us."
"Probably because we helped defend the castle from Team Rocket last week."
Danielle snorted, but didn't respond to that, still heading down to Regirock. Playing with the two Mew was fun, but she often got bored of staying within the interior of the great stone Tree, and she envied the Trainers, who were able to leave whenever they needed to.
The Tree's Mew was already there, talking to Regirock, who was, most decidedly, not moving from his spot.
"Mew?" Danielle asked the psychic cat Pokémon, who turned and looked at her for a moment, then darted away, leaving Regirock in the doorway to rumble discontentedly at them.
"Mew, can you find out what's wrong please?" Danielle petted the Mew on her shoulder's head and it nodded and chased after the other Mew.
"Danielle, would you please return to the Heart of the Tree?" Judy asked calmly, though her mind was already going over possible reasons for Mew to be this worried.
"Judy!" Miranda, one of the younger Trainers who currently lived here, panted, having run through the tree looking for her, "Messenger from Cameron… took them around the back way… at the meeting place…"
"Thanks Miranda." Judy nodded, leaving down the tunnel that had the shortest route to the meeting place, one of the caves deep within the tree, lit by glowing crystals and almost as defensible as the Heart.
Danielle followed, wanting to know what the Queen wanted to say to them, and was shocked to see the messenger's panicked state.
Normally when the messenger got here, they were welcomed and offered drinks and food. This time everyone was prepping for battle.
"Miss Frost." The Messenger nodded quickly, not out of disrespect but out of a need to get his message out quickly. "Lady Eileen sent me to warn you. Cameron Palace is under attack."
"From who?" Judy demanded, as she gestured to Rex and Raven to start organising teams.
"Team Galactic."
Everyone froze.
"Then they have come this far north?" Judy asked, biting her lower lip, this explained the problem with the Regis...
"I'm afraid so." The messenger nodded. "Lady Eileen asks that you don't help the palace. She will negotiate with them."
"They'll want everything the palace has. Rare Pokémon, priceless treasures…"
"Cameron Palace will survive this attack, just as they have others. Lady Eileen asks that you do not come to the palace until a message is sent saying that it is safe to do so. She apologises for this but…"
"I understand." Judy waved the messenger off. "We'll get supplies further afield for a while. Tell Lady Eileen that we will stay away, but if she needs any help, send a messenger and we'll be there as quickly as possible."
"Thank you." The messenger seemed relieved, as if he hadn't believed the Trainers would be reasonable, making Judy wonder what rumours were going around about League Trainers.
The messenger's eyes grew wide as the two Mew floated through the door and attached themselves to Danielle, pretending to whisper in her ear, their eyes glowing with a light they seemed to gain when 'talking' to the girl.
"Would you like a lift down?" Judy asked, knocking on the 'table' which consisted of a rather large stone plinth, to catch the messenger's attention.
"Yes, please." He nodded, watching for a little longer until Julian, one of the pair of Trainers with a team based on Flying types, escorted him out.
"We'd be highly applicative if you could avoid talking about the Mew in front of anyone who might gain an interest in capturing them." Julian said as they reached one of the upper, open branches, on the opposite side of the Tree to the leafless branches and sent out his Charizard.
"I will." The messenger nodded. "Could you drop me off at the bottom of the canyon? The fog's thick enough that no one will see you."
"No problem." Julian nodded, happy to get out for a while, giving the messenger, who couldn't have been very old, maybe old enough to leave if he'd wanted to become a Trainer, but no older, a hand up, as Charizard waited patiently.
"Okay Charizard, let's make this quick." Julian patted his Pokémon's neck.
Charizard leapt off of the stone branch and dove straight down, straightening out too late for his poor Trainer, who by this point had been deafened by the messenger's terrified scream.
He rubbed his ears and grimaced over his shoulder at the guy, who looked half apologetic and half like he was going to hurl. "Sorry."
"It's alright, I tend to forget that there aren't that many people who are used to Charizard's stunts." Julian chuckled, sending Charizard down into the fog, slowly, to try to find somewhere to land.
Unfortunately they were so intent on watching where they were going, that they missed the sound of the incoming Ice Beam until it was too late to dodge.
Charizard tried his best, managing to move enough for the attack to only strike a wing, but when the wing froze, he was unable to fly and the three of them crash landed.
Julian was on his feet in an instant, recalling his Charizard for its own protection and sending out his Pidgeot. "Go." He growled at the messenger, who nodded and ran for it. "Come out here and fight me with honour." Julian growled into the fog.
A laugh echoed around him, seeming to come from all directions at once. "I don't think so." The voice replied, "Surrender now and we'll let you release your Pokémon."
"I don't believe you." Julian shouted back, grimacing as the only reply he got was an Ice Beam which only narrowly missed his foot.
"It's either that or we do this the hard way." The voice replied, Julian scowled, wondering how the thug's attacks were so accurate. A Pokémon like a Glaceon perhaps, with heat sensitive eyes… "Where are the resistance hiding?"
"We're not Resistance." Julian protested.
"If you stand against Galactic, you're resistance, now where are the others."
"Like I'd tell you." He let out a startled cry as an Ice Beam struck his foot, freezing the bottom part of his leg, encasing it in a covering of ice that clung to the floor.
"Where are the resistance?" The voice repeated.
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Noa was unsure whether he was happy with the latest turn of events or not.
He'd been trying to work out what part of the code for Yugi and Jamie's mental data allowed two others to piggyback into his server, and if he could manipulate it, when he'd found out Nesbit had kidnapped Mokuba.
This wasn't acceptable.
Not only was Nesbit running around in a body that didn't belong to him, but kidnapping Mokuba was not part of the plan, even if it had lured Kaiba directly to Lector.
Now he had Mokuba in his grasp, and even as he weaved lies about his brother to the youngest Kaiba brother, he was manipulating Mokuba's mental data, making him more susceptible to suggestion, more believing, wreaking the trust in Seto…
And it was good practise.
Working on a mind that only had data for one person, allowed him to compare it against one with two, and that, in turn helped him with the problem of three minds in one body or avatar.
By the time Seto had finished his match, with the, oh so predictable, outcome of Lector exploding into tiny pieces, and Noa had finished the set up with Mokuba, finishing up with a Seto recreated completely from data, who denied ever wanting to see Mokuba again, breaking Mokuba just enough that the new data took a hold, putting Mokuba under his command, he had a program complied and ready to execute the moment the conditions were right.
There was a moment of guilt, when Mokuba repeated his lie about him being the only one he could trust, but it was washed away quickly, by the thrill of success.
He taunted Kaiba, luring him into following the path Noa had put before him, and was amused when Yugi and Tea followed him.
With the manipulation of just two strings of code, the party was split up again, Seto was alone, Yugi and Tea were minutes behind him, and Joey, Jamie, Serenity, Duke and the monkey formally known as Tristan, were still on the bridge.
No matter how complicated the situation was getting, Noa was Gozabora Kaiba's real son and he would prove himself better then Seto.
With the manipulation of another, Seto was falling, coming to him, falling straight into Noa's trap.
And Mokuba was the perfect bait.
"Thanks for dropping in Seto."
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"I don't like this, I don't like this at all." Jamie muttered angrily as she paced the place where the tunnel had disappeared, taking Seto, Tea and Yugi with it.
"So what? Are we expected to just wait here for them to get back?" Duke demanded, frustrated.
"Uh guys?" Jamie looked over her shoulder to where the robot monkey supposedly hosting Tristan's mind, was panicking, "You might want to look at this."
She trudged over cautiously, still not trusting the monkey one hundred percent, though it acted and sounded like Tristan, or at least it did now that the switch had been flipped, but if there actually was something down there…
Something shot out of the water, causing her to back up.
"Four of the big five!" Joey yelped. "We beat you fair and square."
"But we still have some unfinished business." Gansley sounded far too amused.
'Jamie!' Bakura snarled, having already worked out what was about to happen.
"I know, I know!" Jamie replied, realising what Bakura was on about second before Gansley leapt forward to seize a body. "'Kura!" Jamie let out a frightened squeak.
They swapped, Bakura reaching for the Duel Disk which seemed permanently attached to which ever 'user' was currently using the account, and summoning two monsters, both foxes, who joined Joey's beasts in the sky.
They leapt into the truck as the humans posing as Duel Monsters got into battle with the monsters, Joey, thankfully not saying anything as Bakura clambered in behind Duke, keeping the Big Five members at bay as Joey got the engine started.
"Wheeler!" Bakura snarled, "What's taking so long?"
"If you can do any better…" Joey started growling, only to be cut off when the engine finally kicked in.
"Go!" Bakura kicked the van and Joey put his foot down, sending the two in the back toppling over.
Pushing himself upright, Bakura snarled something rather rude about Joey and his inability to do anything right, then reached for another card, only to find that his deck now consisted of three cards and none of them were monsters.
'That damn maze!' Bakura snarled, cursing Noa and whoever had spawned Noa and everyone ever related to Noa ever.
Duke had 'helpfully' decided to stand up rather then stay knelt, and as such couldn't do anything useful as he had to hold on tight to the rails in order to avoid falling out of the truck as they reached the end of the bridge and headed into the mountains.
"They're gaining on us!" Joey yelped.
"Then drive faster!" Bakura snapped back.
"It won't go any faster!" Joey snarled back.
Judge Man got ahead of them, then Nightmare Penguin and while Joey was dodging those, Jinzo fired on the truck, which had already been straining from taking the turns too sharply at too high a speed, and when hit rolled over, leaving Bakura and Duke in the dust and Joey and Serenity dazed and confused in the truck's cabin.
Joey pulled himself out first, helping Serenity up, "Duke? Bakura?"
"I'm ok." Duke murmured as Bakura gave Joey an amused glance. Since when had Joey had that much concern for him?
Jamie appeared at his side and nudged, "Let me take over."
'It's not safe.'
"We're caught." Jamie's tone was… accepting, "Hopefully the Ring will protect us, like it did before."
'Are you sure?'
"No more then I have been since Battle City started."
Bakura snorted and let her switch with him, just in time for her to be grabbed by her collar and dumped over by the truck, with slightly more dignity then Duke who was simply flung at it by Judge Man.
"Four bodies, one each." Crump sounded amused.
"Not happening." Jamie shook her head, getting to her feet, "You haven't won our bodies, your boss is going to be annoyed, to put it mildly, if you seize ours." She smirked.
Duke wondered if this was more of her acting, like when she'd threatened the goons yesterday, while Joey wondered what the point of Bakura switching with Jamie was if he was going to talk through her anyway.
"We'll have escaped long before Noa finds out!" Crump leapt at her only to be knocked back by a bright light.
Noa stood between the Duel Monsters and the humans. "Want to bet?" He demanded.
"Noa!" Crump backed away quickly.
"I gave you all the chance to win your freedom and you failed. Now you'll pay the price."
Joey and Serenity ducked back into the cabin and Duke seized a hold of the railings he'd been clinging to with one hand, while grabbing Jamie's and pulling her in until she could grab a hold herself, with the other as a tornado swept away the Duel Monsters.
"Gentlemen," Noa continued as the tornado vanished, "You're dismissed. No one breaks my rules and gets away with it!" He, however, didn't vanish with the Duel Monsters, instead turning to look at those assembled.
"They're not the only ones breaking rules here." He looked at Jamie. "Three against on one isn't within the rules."
"There is no rule against being possessed within the game of Duel Monsters either, Noa." Jamie scowled back, "And there are only two of us in here." She tapped her head.
"Still I believe a re-match is in order." Noa replied, snorting his disbelief at her attempt at duplicity. He knew there were three of them in there, he had the data proving it, "On your own, without the help of the others within you."
"Any time, any place, Noa." Jamie nodded, "But this time, when I win, you're going to release everyone you've trapped in this virtual hell, got it?"
"Agreed. Once I've dealt with the Big Five, I'll return and you'd better be ready."
"I will be."
Noa vanished.
"Are you crazy?" Joey demanded, wheeling on her instantly.
"No." Jamie snorted, midnight blue eyes glinting, a smirk gracing her features. "I took Noa down easily last time. I'm not worried now."
"Yeah, when you had Bakura in your head! You heard him, you won't be allowed to ask for help this time!"
"So what? I need someone in my head guiding me?" Jamie glowered at Joey, "I'll do perfectly fine without him, thank you very much."
"Joey… Yugi's possessed too, isn't he?" Duke asked hesitantly.
"Yes…" Joey admitted slowly. "Oh… oh no…"
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Present – Kanto Region, Cameron, Tree of World's Beginning.
They had defended the Tree of World's Beginning for just under a month now but it was over.
A few hours ago the Tree of Beginning had come under a renewed attack from both Team Cypher and Team Galactic, still high on their victory at the Indigo Plateau, the home place of the Pokémon League, which was now little more then rubble and ashes, and while the Trainers, the Tree and it's guardians had fought back, there was little left that they could do.
The Tree of Beginnings was dying.
It's immune system was destroyed, the gems that had grown here ripped out, the Regis captured by Cypher to add to their collection of Shadow Legendary Pokémon, to go with Lugia, Suicune, Raikou and Entai as well as allow them to awaken Regigigas, the Pokémon who had apparently towed the continents when the world had been formed, the ancient Pokémon who had lived at the base of the tree fled or captured…
The Mew that had invited them into their home was dying alongside the tree...
They had been pushed back to the Heart of the Tree, where the last of the crystals stood, encasing the Aura Guardian, Sir Aaron, who had died hundreds of years ago, trying to make their final stand, but even if they repelled Galactic now, the tree would die because there was no Aura Guardian among them to give their aura to save it.
Even Danielle, who had Mew in her arms, the little pink cat too weak to float any more, and had called on the Mew of New Forest to come and help, was unable to do anything to save the tree.
"It's all over." The grunts who were facing them smirked, "Surrender now and we might consider letting you go."
"Liar!" Danielle snapped, making Raven look over his shoulder at her for just a moment.
Her eyes glowing pink as she glowered at the grunts, the Mew from New Forest teleporting to her side and looking at her quickly before sending the Grunts sprawling.
"Mew, mewewew." It demanded of the others, taking Danielle's hand, dragging her away from the crystals and the other Trainers.
Danielle's eyes widened as Mew started glowing, "Run!" She told the others, panic clear, "Galactic are going to Rend the tree!"
"What?" The youngest of the Trainers yelped.
"Run!" Danielle begged them and then she was gone, teleported away.
The Trainers fled, heading down and out, escaping out onto the branches and giving those without flying Pokémon lifts out of there.
Judy, who had been captured with a group of four, when they'd tried to free the Regis, watched in horror as Danielle appeared out of nowhere, one Mew in her arms, another by her side, teleporting directly into the group of several New Species Pokémon that had arrived just moments ago, teleporting in from different forests and lakes, only to be caught up in the Spacial Rend that Palkia tore in reality, which sucked up Danielle, the collection of Mew, the Tree and every single Pokémon or Trainer who hadn't managed to escape.
"NO!" Judy bellowed, trying to pull out of the arms of her captors, scared for all those still in the tree, succeeding but unable to do anything to save her friends.
"Was that really necessary?" Evice complained at Saturn, "You just sent six Mew through the Rend to the Otherworld. Do you have any idea how rare those things are? If I'd known so many Mew lived here, I'd have had you bring one in!"
"We had no idea there was anything more of value in that tree. As far as we were aware there was nothing left worth saving."
"An understandable mistake, resistance members are a dozen a poke-dollar." Evice shrugged, "The dirt on my shoes is worth more then…" He cut off when Judy snapped, going to attack him, only to be knocked down by Mars, a fellow commander.
She glowered at him from her place on the floor.
Mars, the second youngest of the Galactic Admins smirked at her. "If you don't mind, Charon's been riding me for weeks about getting a hold of a couple of Trainers who'd been exposed to Aura and that Tree was soaked in the stuff…"
"Go ahead. We have no use for them." Evice snorted, "Unless one of them turns out PKNE positive."
"Give the PKNEs to you, so they can escape like that fire girl?" Mars snorted.
"We have an agreement." Evice glowered.
"Indeed we do." Saturn scowled at Mars, who backed down only because Palkia was under his command, "We'll test them but I doubt there are any PKNEs among this lot. It was only a small group."
"Be careful with that!" Evice's attention was drawn away by a loud crash as the cage containing an unconscious Aerodactyl was knocked over. "Excuse me…" He stalked off.
"How much longer do we have to put up with them?" Mars growled, as she gestured to two Galactic Grunts, who dragged Judy to her feet and chucked her in with the other, captured Trainers.
"Not long now. We just need Dialga."
"Shouldn't Mercury have recovered it by now?"
"She should but…" Saturn's tone revealed his distaste for his colleague.
"You don't think she's up to the task?" Mars asked, intrigued, having never heard Saturn mention anything about the other admins before.
"I think someone with a little more experience and a lot longer fuse should be running the Otherworld Team." He scowled.
"It's not like there's any real resistance. There aren't any Trainers in the Otherworld."
"Only the ones we've sent there and the few who have spent far too much time with Francis." Saturn replied, pausing in the conversation to direct the Grunts to their assigned tasks.
"Francis? She's still a problem?" Mars was surprised. She knew Trainers could be difficult but… "How is she…?"
"At this point, her interference is an example of how inept Mercury is." Saturn scowled, "Any other admin would have dealt with her by now."
Mars paused, thought for a moment, then smirked. "How dangerous are Francis and her Trainers?"
"If they don't get their hands on Dialga, there's no problem."
"And if they do?"
"There's several ways it could go."
"Send me; I'll get the job done." Mars told him, without any hint of doubt in her mind. "By the time I'm finished, Francis and her group won't be a problem."
"How many Grunts will you need?" At this point, Saturn was willing to send her, if only to stop Mercury whining about having to focus on searching for the Master Ball rather then invading the Domino Day Care and seizing back their Pokémon, or hunting down their targets.
"Just the six I've trained personally." Mars replied with a grin that showed her sharp canines.
"That's all?"
"That's all I'll need."
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"We can help you save Mokuba!" Tea protested as Kaiba tried to leave, "He's our friend too!"
Kaiba snorted, "I can handle Noa. If I were you I'd worry about him." He gestured towards one of the great stone plinths in the area.
Yugi turned to look, "Nesbit!"
Nesbit, still wearing Tristan's body laughed at them. "Yes and it's not just me in here!"
"We're all using this body, and between the five of us, we'll crush you." Crump crowed.
"If you want your friend's body back, you'll duel us." It was Lector's turn now and he addressed Yugi directly.
"Five on one isn't fair." Joey protested, as Yugi stepped forward, ready to accept the challenge.
"It isn't only Yugi we're challenging." Lector gave him a look that clearly stated that he'd missed something.
"We're challenging everyone who shares their avatar with another." Johnson was out now. "So that includes you, Francis."
Jamie's midnight blue eyes flickered to Yugi, who nodded at her calmly and switched with Yami.
"That still only totals four." Joey scowled. "So you can count me in. That puts the total at five on five."
"You sure about this Joey?" Yami asked, concerned.
"Fine." Johnson sounded amused, "But since its three bodies against one, we'll start with twelve thousand life points while you three start with four thousand."
"Are you five ready to lose?" Gansley demanded.
"No." Joey snorted, already beginning to have trouble keeping up with who was in charge of Tristan's body, which they seemed to be playing musical chairs with, "Cause you're the ones going down." Joey's disk activated last and the cards started scrolling past.
'Pick your cards carefully and remember what I said about…' Bakura started.
"I know, I don't need your help here." Jamie cut him off, "I know what I'm doing." She picked her deck out and chose Kitsune Maiden as her Deck Master again.
Yami nodded approvingly and chose the Dark Magician.
Joey snorted, completely unsurprised by Yugi's choice and also made the obvious choice of the Flame Swordsman.
"Now then…" The Big Five's total climbed to a depressing total of twelve thousand, "It's time to Duel!"