//------------------------------// // Episode 48: Sick Psyche Out: Part 2 // Story: Yu-Gi-Oh E-QUEST // by DakariKingMykan //------------------------------// EPISODE FORTY-EIGHT Onboard the camper, the scanners detected Terra’s movement below. “She’s left the ship?” asked Robin. “Looks like it.” said Vic “I’m going to call her.” Terra had made it out to a large rock formation a hundred yards away from the ship. She was high enough to see the duel happening at the top of the platform, and she was certain none of the others could see her. Her communicator went off, and she answered it. “Titans…? Where are you?” “We’re just overhead on free-float.” answered Vic. Terra looked up, but she couldn’t see the camper anywhere. She then explained everything that was happening and why she had left the ship. “So you’re trying to get the soul cards from the Prince Brothers?” said Robin “And the others are trying to sabotage the plan to gather more duel energy?” “That’s right,” replied Terra “I don’t know what’s going on with the girls, but I can’t make a move yet, not until I get a perfect shot to surprise the brothers.” Shining Armor felt worried for Twilight, while Cadance and Luna were concerned about the girls well. “Even if they do find anything, how can they be sure if they can shut down the source?” wondered Luna. “They’ll find a way.” said Cadance “They’ve got to.” Back in the ship, the girls and Raven were before the large forbidden door, still cloaked by Raven’s aura. Just like when Terra left, Raven cursed the metal so they could all seep right through it. On the other side of the door, the girls found nothing more than one of the main engine floors, with all the machinery and wires, the works. There were also a few technicians doing their rounds, making certain that the systems were all working right. They couldn’t see the gang of course. Twilight found it all to be “Most phenomenal” but nothing to indicate anything suspicious. “Wait, look down there.” Applejack said pointing over the stair rails, at another door at the end of the room. “I’ll levitate us over.” said Raven. “Everyone, huddle close.” The girls did as they were told and Raven levitated them all up on a solid dark disc she formed, safely lifting them all over the machinery and past the workers, to just before the door. “Dang…” said Applejack “You’re mighty good at that stuff.” Raven raised up her shoulders in a soft, “Eh.” Suddenly, she and the others could all feel something strange; some kind of waving warmth seemingly coming from the door. “This is it.” said Rarity “Whatever we’re looking for has to be on the other side of this door.” The others agreed, but this time when Raven tried to curse the metal like she did before, nothing happened. She tried again and still nothing. “It must be made a special material.” she deduced. “It’s got to be enforced by malefic magic.” agreed Applejack “We won’t be able to bust into it.” Rarity sighed, “Well, isn’t this dandy. Now how are we supposed to get in?” Twilight suspected if they couldn’t get through the door, then coming up from underneath would do no good either as the floor inside would be reinforced to conceal whatever was inside. …But then she happened to spot a card slot in the wall next to the door. “We’ll hack our way in!” she decided, and she dropped her backpack down and pulled out her small tool-kit. “Wait!” cried Rarity “What if one of the workers see you? We may be invisible, but the console isn’t.” Lucky for them once more, a buzzing sound was heard, making them all jump. At first they feared it was a warning alarm, only to be dismissed that all the workers were leaving through the exit as it was time to change shifts. “Perfect.” Raven said under her breath, and she waited until the last worker was gone and the door shut. Then she used her powers to put a small barrier on the inside of the door so it would be stuck, which would hopefully stall the next shift of workers just long enough for Twilight to do her thing. Astounded, Applejack asked, “Is there anything you can’t do?” Raven gave a cheeky grin and teased, “Do you really want to know?” Nevertheless, Twilight got to work quickly, unscrewing the panel of the console, and she began to fiddle with the wires. While all that was going on the duel was still going on too. Karle LP: 7500 Masquerade LP: 7200 Rainbow looked back and forth between Masquerade and Karle, and she felt very weary from all that happened, and yet the duel still only just begun. “Sakes, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a duel like this.” she said “Two strong duelists facing each other, and both with miserable attitudes to boot.” Sunset agreed, “Still, we should observe them as best as we can. Remember, one of us is going to be facing one of them in the final round.” Rainbow agreed and kept her focus up. Karle glared at Masquerade and his two monsters. She began to contemplate again, not willing to let anything slip by her. “Let’s see, so far he’s got those two wimps on the field, and a couple of face-downs.” She looked up at her own monster, knowing it still couldn’t be targeted or destroyed by card effects. “Whatever he played facedown surely must be a way to either block my attack, or even power up his own monsters, but that’s not what worries me most.” She remembered he had send another card from his hand to the graveyard on his last turn, and didn’t make any attempts to use it, or even give hints if it was just that. “I’m not going to let him psyche me out! This is the day I’ve waited and planned for, and I am going to take him down!” Masquerade was losing his patience, “Are you going to make a move or what?” Karle growled, and drew her next card. Then she gazed sinisterly over it. “Let’s see how you like this! I activate MYSTICAL SPACE TYPHOON, and I’ll use it to destroy Premature Burial, and of course, that means your Chaos Hunter goes bye-bye along with it!” Masquerade growled, and the lightning and winds struck his field hard, blowing both his cards away! Karle snickered, “So much for her, because now that she’s gone, I’m free to do this; I set LUNALIGHT WOLF in my Pendulum Zone!” Her wolf climbed high into the light and let out a loud howl at the darkness above. “I see…” said Masquerade “You intend to make another Fusion Summon, am I right.” “You’re burning up.” said Karle “Thanks to Wolf’s pendulum ability, I can banish from my graveyard, Panther Dancer, Cat Dancer and Black Sheep!” The spirits of the monsters emerged and vanished, and the darkness over Karle’s fields grew stronger still as the ground rumbled. “What good is having one monster in play when I can have two?! I Fusion summon another LUNALIGHT LEO DANCER!” (Atk: 3500) The two monsters stood together and nodded at one another. “Oh, great!” groaned Pinkie “One of them was hard enough, now there’s another!” Fluttershy trembled softly, “I’m starting to wish I stayed downstairs!” Celestia honestly didn’t know which of the two duelists to feel more concerned about, and it was then that she had another relax relapse, and she drowsed comfortably in her seat without much of a care until it passed again. “Now!” shouted Karle “Let’s see how you like double the power of my Leo Dancers!” She called to one of them, “…Attack that overgrown, Garzet!” Her monster complied and raised her huge sword as lightning formed around, and she unleashed it straight for the weakened Garzet. “I think not!” sneered Masquerade “I activate the trap JUST DESSERTS!” “Ah!” cried Karle. “For every monster you have in play, you’ll be dealt 500 points of damage!” Karle LP: 7500 -----> 6500 “She just took 1000 points of damage!” cried Sunset, “And that means… the Megamorph card will double Garzet’s attack points!” (Atk: 2500) -----> (Atk: 10,000) “WHOA!!” shouted Rainbow. “Ten-thousand attack points?!” “No!!” cried Karle. Masquerade shook his head as the attack got even closer, and Karle couldn’t call it off. “This is what happens when you overthink things, as well as give me one of your cards! Now you’re about to lose it all!” The attack was just about to strike. “Don’t think so!” snapped Karle “I activate the trap INVERSE UNIVERSE!” Masquerade gawked behind his mask. “This trap switches the attack and defense points of every effect monster out on the field!” (Atk: 3500) -----> (Atk: 3000) x2 (Atk: 10,000) -----> (Atk: 0) Masquerade growled angrily! “His monster’s attack has dropped to zero!” cried Sunset. Karle’s attack was about to make contact. “Say goodbye!” she shouted. “Never!” yelled Masquerade “I play a trap of my own; CARD OF LAST WILL! It activates whenever the attack points of my monster is reduced to zero by a card effect. Now I can draw until I have five cards in hand.” He drew four cards. “Like that’s going to make a difference!” sneered Karle. Masquerade snuffed, and discarded one card from his hand just as the attack struck, blowing his fiend off the field in a big explosion. Masquerade groaned and braced himself from the force of the shockwaves. “So there!” growled Karle, but when the smoke had cleared, what did she see but a wall of fuzzy little fur ball creatures all over Masquerade’s field. “What’s this?!” Pinkie and Fluttershy’s eyes lit up at the cutesy little critters. “So adorable!” cried Fluttershy, and let out a scream of delight “So much cuter than ten-thousand puppies!!” While Masquerade felt sick to their cooing, he called over to Karle. “You see surprised. By discarding KURIBOH from my hand, its special ability summons a wall of its companions to the field to absorb all the damage I would have taken from the attack, leaving my life points unharmed.” Sunset and Rainbow were astounded. “What a way to dodge.” said Rainbow. Karle growled and quivered, but then she smirked. “So you blocked one attack? Big deal, surely you know my Leo Dancer is allowed to attack twice in one turn, and that means both of them!” Her two monsters stood together and ready to strike, and Karle ordered the first one to attack again! “Think again!” sneered Masquerade “When you declare a direct attack, I summon BATTLE FADER!” “Ah!” cried Karle, and the dumpy little monster appeared. (Atk: 0) “He was stopped during the last duel, but now he’s stopped you!” called Masquerade, and Leo Dancer skidded to a halt, and Karle’s battle phase was finished. She growled louder and madder, shaking worse than ever! The spectators could see she was really raving mad! “What’s wrong?” taunted Masquerade “Has your overconfidence let you down, like I knew it would, or are you ready to do the sensible thing and knock it off with your foolish attempts to beat me?” “Can it…!” Karle growled “I’ll never give in, and I will beat you! That’s the whole reason I joined this tournament-- to take you down once and for all!” She ended her turn with one facedown card. Her hand was now empty, but her Leo Dancers’ attack strengths went back to 3500 now that the effect of her trap was over. Celestia shook her head at Karle’s wailing as she thought, “She has such an obsession with him. I wonder what it is that drives her to all this anger and pushiness.” She began to contemplate on all this, as well as wondering who Karle really was. She thought about it so much, that she had another shock of relaxation and slipped off into a soft doze while sitting upright in her seat. Pinkie waved her hand before her face, and she didn’t respond. She and Fluttershy shrugged and just continued to watch the duel. “My move now.” said Masquerade. He drew his card, and he snickered at it. “Since you’re so good at making decisions-- not…!” Karle grinded her teeth! “…Let’s see you work with this! I activate the spell PAINFUL CHOICE!” Karle growled, and the spectators all gawked. “You know how this works, don’t you!” he then grabbed five cards out of his deck and, the duel images revealed them to Karle. “Choose one of these cards for me to keep and I’ll send the others to the graveyard.” Karle looked at all five of the cards; all five of them were monsters. They were… GIANT GERM… LEGENDARY FIEND… CARD GUARD… WALL OF ILLUSION… PUPPET MASTER. “Those monsters…!” Karle thought as she looked them all over “Any one of them would be dangerous if I let him keep either one of them. I should probably choose the Legendary Fiend, because it has the power to get stronger every turn. Wait! What if that’s what he wants me to choose? Yeah... he may want me to choose that monster, and then he’ll have a plan with it. But then again, what if he knows I’ll hesitate to choose it, pick one of the other monsters, and he has something planned with them too?” As she thought and thought, it was obvious to everyone that she was going crazy in her mind, unable to make a decision. “This is just too good.” thought Masquerade “Of course it won’t matter which of them she chooses, I’ll have exactly where I need her. But I’d still like to know who she really is. I recognize only some of her dueling style now and the cards she’s played, but there was only one duelist who ever played as strategically as she did.” He thought back to that time again, and the images of the duelist he faced were still little blurry. He shook it all off, figuring the only way to solve this was to keep dueling. “Well, come on!” he called to Karle “Pick a card already, or just give up.” Karle knew she had to make a choice and couldn’t stall forever, “Keep Giant Germ!” she snapped. “Keep it and send the others away.” Masquerade did as he was told, keeping the one card and tossing the others away. “Of course, it didn’t matter which of them you chose anyway.” “Huh?” “I activate the spell MONSTER REINCANATION! I send Giant Germ to the graveyard, and I am able to grab any monster I choose; I’ll pick Puppet Master!” Sunset cringed softly as she watched him take his cards, “Slick move!” she thought “No matter which card Karle chose, he was ready for her either way.” Karle clenched her fists in anger for still being outsmarted. Masquerade snickered, “Now I sacrifice Battle Fader in order to summon my Puppet Master in defense mode!” (Def: 0) Fluttershy shuddered at the sight of the fearful looking fiend and hid her face behind her long hair whimpering “Tell me when the scary part is over!” Rainbow looked up at the new monster. “It’s got zero defense points.” she thought “It must have one heck of ability or he wouldn’t summon it.” She was right as Masquerade declared, “Now I activate Puppet Master’s ability, which requires me to trade 2000 life points…” Masquerade LP: 7200 -----> 5200 “…And in exchange, I can now call two Fiend-Type monsters from the graveyard to join us on the field, but they won’t be able to attack this turn.” Karle growled as she watched Puppet Master fired his cursed strings into the ground and bringing forth two monsters. “I bring back GIANT GERM… and CARD GUARD!” (Def: 100) (Def: 500) “And by the way, Card Guard has a special ability as well; when it’s summoned, I play one Guard Counter on it!” A glowing orb appeared on the front of the sinister monster. “But then, I can transfer that Guard Counter to any other creature that I choose, and I choose my Giant Germ!” The magical orb left the first monster and hovered over the other one. “What do you think that shiny orb does?” asked Pinkie. Fluttershy just peeked nervously through her hair, “I don’t think I want to know.” “Now I activate the spell MIRAGE OF NIGHTMARE! Now, on your next standby phase, I’ll get draw until I have four cards in hand, but on my next standby phase I’ll have to discard that many cards that I hold. Now I end my turn with one facedown.” Karle snuffed, “It’s my move! I draw!” “Hold it!” called Masquerade “Thanks to my Mirage card I now draw four cards, which gives me more options!” “I bet I know what he’s up to.” she thought “I know what that Guard Counter does: it prevents a monster it’s attached to from being destroyed. But this doesn’t make sense. He knows my Leo Dancers can destroy all special summoned monsters when they attack. I’ll bet his facedown card-- I’ll bet it’s something he’s set up in other to hold me up again! We’ll I’m not going to be falling for it this time.” She raised her hand up high, “I play POT OF GREED, so I can draw two cards.” She looked down at what she had and liked it all. I activate the spell card LUNALIGHT PERFURME! It allows me to special summon my Lunalight Blue Cat out of the graveyard!” (Atk: 1600) “And since she was special summoned, her ability doubles the attack of one of my Leo Dancers.” (Atk: 3500) -----> (Atk: 7000) The spectators all shuddered nervously again as the Leo Dancer glowed with power and might, but Masquerade merely folded his arms, feeling unimpressed, which really irked Karle. “You can put up the tough guy act all you like, it won’t stop me! I activate Lunalight Wolf’s Pendulum Ability again, which allows me to, once again, Fusion Summon using monsters on my field and in my graveyard. I fuse Lunalight White Rabbit and Lunalight Blue Cat, so I once again Fusion Summon my faithful LUNALIGHT CAT DANCER!” (Atk: 2400) Masquerade was hardly amused. “And now I activate her special ability, by tributing my weaker Leo Dancer, my Cat Dancer can make two attacks on each of your monsters. The first time around, they won’t be destroyed, but every time she attacks, you’ll take 100 points of damage!” Masquerade clenched his fist. “Cat Dancer, strike all three of those monsters!” shouted Karle, and her monster complied, leaping up into the air, and swinging her sword hard, sending a shockwave of lightning over at the others monsters. Not one of them was destroyed as promised, and just as promised, Masquerade took 300 points of damage. Masquerade LP: 5200 -----> 4900 “Now, attack them all again!” Karle shouted, and this time both the Puppet Master and Card Guard were destroyed. “I remove the Guard Counter from my Giant Germ!” hollered Masquerade “By doing this, my Germ cannot be destroyed!” The last attack bounced right off the blubbery creature. “Big deal!” sneered Karle “You still take more damage from each attack!” Masquerade LP: 4900 -----> 4600 “And now my super strong Leo Dancer will attack, and you won’t be able to block her this time!” Her Leo Dancer gripped her sword tight, leapt over to the other side of the field, and came down hard on the germ, slicing it down the middle and destroying it with ease. “You just activated Giant Germ’s ability, causing you to lose 500 life points. You should know better than to attack something with such power.” called Masquerade, and at that second a whole bunch of tiny dark spores surrounded and bombarded Karle hard. Karle LP: 6500 -----> 6000 “And further, I now summon forth two more giant Germs to the field!” (Atk: 1000) x2 Karle snickered softly, and then she burst out laughing like a maniac. “You think that bothers me at all? Well it doesn’t, you see, now you have two new monsters in play, which means my Cat Dancer is allowed to attack you again!” Her Cat Dancer stood ready, and she ordered it to attack both germs. “If this attack hits, Masquerade will lose a ton of his life points!” cried Rainbow. Sunset clenched her fists with anxiety. The Cat Dancer was about to strike! “Just a minute!” snapped Masquerade “I activate the trap card THE REGULATION OF TRIBE!” “What?” cried Karle, and before she knew it, both her monsters were bound up by strong chains. “This trap allows me to call out one monster-type-- I choose “Beast-Warrior”-- and now that type of monster is forbidden to attack!” Karle was ever so outraged. Since all her monsters were Beast-Warrior, any of them she summoned wouldn’t be able to attack at all. She couldn’t help but wonder in thought, “If he had that trap all the time, why didn’t he play it earlier instead of letting me destroy his monsters?” She thought, and she thought, and she wondered, “… I think he’s planning for something, something really huge, but what?” Masquerade loved watching her contemplate and trying to figure him out, and fail at it of course. “She can think all she likes; she’ll never be prepared for what I have. If there’s one thing I learned and mastered while dueling, it’s you must always keep your opponents guessing, and always keep multiple strategies and plans. This makes it impossible for your opponent to determine any one way you can possibly go.” The spectators all gazed on, watching the duel was astonishment and anxiety, while Celestia continued to sleep in her drowsiness. She began to dream; she was walking in a white realm, with a misty floor. “Where am I?” she wondered “I thought I was watching Karle duel Masquerade.” Suddenly, there before her appeared large letters in long glowing streaks of light. They spelled out the name… Karle “Wits” Plight Celestia couldn’t understand what this meant, or why she was even dreaming about this. Suddenly, the letters all began to move around like a scrambling puzzle. The letters moved out of view, so only she could see them ahead as they began to come back together spelling another name, which made Celestia gasp…! “No! It can’t be…!” She was so shocked by what she had seen, that she snapped awake almost instantly. “Oh!” she groaned. “Are you okay?” asked Sunset “You dozed off.” Celestia rubbed her eyes, but didn’t answer as she was too busy contemplating on what she dreamt. “Was what I saw real?” she thought to herself, and she began to contemplate silently on other things she had before, much to the girls’ concern. “I think we’ve lost her.” said Pinkie. Meanwhile, down below in the engine room, Twilight was still configuring the wires, while at the same time the gang could hear the pounding and yelling of men behind the main doors in back, unable to get it open. “Anytime now…!” Raven said to Twilight “My barrier’s starting to break!” “I’ve almost got it!” snapped Twilight, then, all at once the doors opened wide. “Way to go!” said Applejack. “Quickly, inside!” cried Rarity. The girls all marched through, and Raven used her powers to put the panel and wires all back to leave no traces of tampering. The doors began to close and just snapped shut as her barrier on the main door ceased. The workers all busted through. “Hey, it just opened.” “What the heck happened?” “Never mind that, were way behind schedule. Let’s get to work on these engines.” So the men set to work without a single clue of anything at all. While inside the large room, it was a warm and a little wavy, and the girls all gawked in awe at what lay before them-- several huge cylindrical tanks were set up. Each tank was a large a huge oak tree, and twice as tall as the girls. Each tank had small portholes on them, in which you could look through and see flowing white energy with funky transitions and a sparks here and there. “This is it!” cried Rarity “This is what we’ve been looking for!” “…The Duel Energy!” muttered Applejack Even Raven had to admit, “… O----kay, kind of cool.” The warmth of the air was caused by the energy being gathered from the duel, and it was plain to see the tanks were almost full to the top. “I get it.” said Twilight “When people duel they give off vast amounts of energy-- thinking, strategizing, and enduring all the forces of the shockwaves from the holograms. It can really tire them out. Somehow, The Prince Brothers harness the energy that flows and store it within these tanks.” “I think we get all that,” said Applejack “But that still don’t explain what they want this stuff for.” “Well, whatever it is, we mustn’t let them.” said Rarity “We must find some way to shut this down.” The all looked over at Raven, and she immediately shook her head “I can’t penetrate this metal, remember, and besides mixing my power with this vast amount of energy could be dangerous. …It may blow up the entire ship.” The girls gasped. “Well, that’s out then.” said Applejack. There were also no computer consoles, no controls, or things like that in the entire room, which only suggested that the energy was being harnessed magically by The Prince Brothers. Rarity suddenly looked up at the pipes connected to the tanks, and they were glowing as more energy flowed through, into the tanks, indicating the duel was really up. As the energy in the tanks, the waviness of the air became warmer, and Rarity could feel her hair starting to stick up and out a little. “Oh, no!” she groaned “I believe is getting full of a little static electricity.” Twilight took a few steps away from the tanks, and almost stepped out of Raven’s aura field. “What are you doing?” Raven asked. “I… I have to get out of here.” “What? What are you talking about?” asked Applejack. “I can’t stay here, it’s not safe… Not safe… Not safe… Not safe...” She just kept repeating that over and over again as her head began to swing back and forth several times. The others all gawked back and forth at one another, as Twilight meant more and more berserk, until finally, she stopped, and her eyes went out like lights, and she fell over backwards, out of the aura field, and flat on the floor which triggered an alarm system. The workers outside turned their heads towards the forbidden room. “Quick, get security!” “I’m on it!” The guards arrived in almost no time, and one used a special key card to enter the chamber, only to find nobody was inside at all. “Who’s in here?” “Show yourself!” “There’s no one in here.” “But the alarms went off.” “How can anyone get in here without a pass anyway?” The girls had scooped Twilight up, and lifted her back into the aura field, and they knew the jig was up and made their way out, into the engine room, and back into the main hallways. There, they headed straight for the guest suite where Raven ceased the aura field, and a motionless Twilight was laid on the sofa. Rarity groaned in anger, “I can’t believe we were ever so close to stopping our enemies! So close!” Applejack then gasped, “I don’t believe it!” “I know!” agreed Rarity “It’s awfully horrible!” “Not that!” said Applejack “Take a look here…!” she pointed at Twilight’s eyes showing them were made of a kind of glass, and a couple of wires were sticking out from the ears, plus her entire body felt as solid as metal. “…This isn’t Twilight, it’s an android!” The trio all feel silent in total shock! To Be Continued...