A/N: Why am I starting a new series before I've even gotten halfway done with my current one? Good question! Because if I don't write this down now, I'll forget it. Crappy memory problems and all that. AND DAMNED WRITER'S BLOCK. But, I will update that story too, as it contains backstory, context, and information for a lot of what's going to happen in this one.

Disclaimer: Still start too many stories without finishing them, still suck at writing romances, still don't own this show.

There wasn't much to say about this Saturday morning on September. It was fairly normal, no veil breaches, no Choten goons, no poisoning of the water supply. And why shouldn't it be, it had been a full seven months since the attempted San Campion takeover, and with the partial re-fortifying of the veil, not many creatures slipped through the cracks as much.

Granted, there had been a lot of work going into this newfound peace. Lots of rebuilding, re-unifying, peace treatments, peace treatments within peace treatments due to an accidental word slip or harsh tone, but it had been all worth it for the sake of both worlds.

Pardons towards many creatures and newfound alliances sprung up in this wake, unified in their hatred of the Choten. Some believed he may still be alive, but in hiding, and would stop at nothing to reclaim his former glory, and exact a bloody and violent vengeance on his conquerors. But, the creatures of the realms refuse to let him get any sort of foothold, and scoured the 5 civilizations, searching in every nook and cranny to annihilate him once and for all, if he still remains.

The Choten doesn't matter now, but those injured that he left in ruins in his chaotic path of violence can still feel the aftermath of his presence. Raiden Pierce-Okamoto himself had joined with the first few scouting missions, to make doubly certain that his family would never be torn asunder once more. The 5 masters made sure that Alakshmi Verma herself was properly taken care of, and given a stable living environment albeit with some help of their own.

And Ken Okamoto, who had found both an equal hatred and respect for the creature realm due to circumstances beyond his control, was busy sleeping in. It wasn't like he'd anything else much to do, considering his own healing process (and hair regrowth) and polite resignation from the Order of The Duel Masters. But, something was keeping him just on the tipping edge of consciousness and slumber. Distant arguing voices, mostly.

"…sure you don't need any help?"

"Yeah, it's fine just… I can do this, okay?"

"Well, no offense, but the last time you tried this, the results were…"

"You guys just wait in the other room, I'll call you if I need anything, alright?"

The voices died down, but a certain urge prevented him from falling asleep again. He rolled over, trying to see if it was his position for a few seconds, before returning to his original starting slump. He groaned, still half-asleep and rubbed his eyes. And then, a loud frightened yell from his son and the sound of fire blasting upwards caused him to rapidly jolt out of bed.

"Raiden!" He yelled, nearly tripping over the bedsheets that he dragged along with him by accident. He rushed down the stairs as fast as possible, and rushed towards the billowing cloud of dark black smoke emerging from the kitchen. Catching his breath, he stood in the doorway, covering himself with the sheet with one hand, and clutching onto the side of the doorway with the other. "Raiden, what's going on?!"

"No, no, no! Don't come in!" Ray yelled back in response, shutting off the stove and scraping a gooey black substance out off the bottom of a frying pan with a spatula. The death grip on both objects only seemed to tighten as Ray tried to hide what he was doing. "Just go back to bed, it's fine!"

Ken's fear and concern quickly faded away into confusion and fatherly regard. "It's alright, just had me worried, that's all." He inhaled and exhaled deeply. "But, what exactly are you doing?"

Ray took a deep breath, and gestured a bit with the spatula as he spoke. "Well, mom's out for her run, and Grandpa and Uncle Isao went out to breakfast together because they feel like they really haven't been spending much time together, they didn't want to wake you up, so they said they would bring something back, but I didn't know if it'd be cold or not, so I tried to make you breakfast in bed myself, and, uh…" He motioned towards the tar-like substance in the pan. "Yeah, didn't turn out too well."

Ken gently placed a hand on Ray's shoulder. "It was a touching gesture, and I appreciate it. Just, please try not to go too far with things. Wouldn't want you to end up making a fool of yourself."

"Okay, that's more than Ray's dad that I needed to see." Allie's voice suddenly muttered from behind them.

Apparently, the other voices that he'd heard while half-asleep had belonged to Ray's friends. And the both of them accidentally ended up getting a clear view of Ken's bruised and half-healed back scars, as well as seeing him in his boxers from behind. The end result was an extremely flustered and bright red Mr. Okamoto rushing back upstairs, calling down "Just be sure to clean up after you're done!"

Gabe and Allie uncovered their eyes after the sound of retreating footsteps slowly faded away. Ray dejectedly placed the pan and spatula in the sink and started to clear the table of plates with a sigh. Gabe, attempting to lighten the mood, said "Well, at least this won't totally go to waste. I'm sure we can reuse these burnt eggs as some kind of fuel."

"Eggs?" Ray asked. "Gabe, those were supposed to be pancakes!"

After the mishap at breakfast, Ray, Gabe, and Allie had left to meet Lucy at the smoothie shop, for a casual hang-out outside of school and dueling. The four of them were currently talking about their respective lives, obsessions, and general anxieties over their studies. But, they could always laugh it off and just enjoy each other's company. After a few minutes of general small talk, Lucy tapped the side of her grape and cherry smoothie with her straw, and held it up.

"A toast," she said. "To surviving the first week back to school!" Allie and Ray cheered and tapped their smoothies to hers.

Gabe shook his head. "It honestly wasn't that bad you guys, I honestly liked getting back to a sort of structure in my daily routine... but... eh." He tapped his smoothie to the others with less vigor and sat it back down in front of him harder than he should have.

"Ehh, I think we've got enough of a routine with our dueling stuff," Lucy said, putting her straw back in. "But then again, pop quizzes are still a little more stressful than banishing creatures, especially if you've gotten so used to it, like you guys."

"It's only been a year," Ray said, right before he took a sip of his smoothie. Which he immensely regretted, as Gabe and Allie yelled back "A YEAR?" causing him to nearly choke on orange and lime slush.

"Yeah, I thought you guys knew," Ray said, collecting himself. "I mean, isn't that why we came here in the first place?"

Allie and Gabe were quiet for a minute. Had it really been an entire year since they'd joined Kaijudo, learned about the coming war, and were nearly flattened by Flametropus? It all seemed to have happened so fast, but there was still so much of it that it had hardly felt real. Lucy was even more confused, having started about two months after they had.

"Well, technically, it was yesterday," Gabe said softly, after a long pause. "I mean, you were the one that was the naturally talented duelist, and you summoned a hybrid as the likes that none of them had seen before!"

"And you convinced us to stay after that! We wouldn't know anything if it wasn't for you!" Allie added, trying to keep her voice down as well. "Man, this calls for some kinda celebration, doesn't it?"

"I'm sure the masters would appreciate it," Lucy said, grinning. "You're practically their kid! Saved their backs a bajillion times, and the world too."

While these four were coming up with possible Kaijudo Anniversary palns, outside the shop stood a young boy with a letter in this hands. It was Kevin, a young boy that went to Ray's school. He gulped, looking between the letter he held in his hands, and through the window to see Lucy, laughing happily among her friends.

He tensed up, unsure of what to do, or where to even start. He didn't want to interrupt what they were talking about, but he didn't want to scare her by apparently waiting for her outside. He took a deep breath, and walked into the shop, holding his head high and the letter tight. Over to the booth he walked, his confidence shrinking with every step he took.

"Oh, hey, Kevin!" Ray called, looking up and over at him. Kevin froze, nearly dropping the letter as he stared in response. Allie and Ray scooted over a little so that he could sit with them. He cleared his throat and walked to the seat, sitting down and looking at the table, surprised he'd gotten this far.

"Hey. Uh, hey, Lucy?" He said, holding up the letter. "I found this. It's for you. At least I think it's for you, I dunno. I found it from someone's backpack. I-I didn't steal it, but I just found it. I think they wanted you to have it, so…" HE placed the letter on the table and scooted it over to her, internally panicking.

"Oh! Uh, thanks. That's cool." Lucy said, looking at the letter. It was a soft pastel green, with her name written in cursive. The tongue was held down with a golden heart sticker which shimmered a little bit in the light. "Guess I have some kinda secret admirer!"

"Sure looks like it!" Kevin said, getting up from the table. "Well, I'd better be going, wouldn't want to annoy any of you."

"Nah, it's alright. You can stay, you're not annoying!" Allie said. "It's not exactly a private party here."

"I'll get you a smoothie, just sit tight!" Lucy said, sticking the letter into her front pocket. Kevin stifled a groan as he sat down. Things weren't at all going the way he'd planned. But hey, at least he was with friendly company, that was always nice.