The Cheerleader Strikes Back

LAST CHAPTER! Yup, sorry, but true! But don't worry. I go out with a REALLY big bang…

Chapter 20

Never Saw This Coming…

"I'll set this card face down to end my turn." Tea said. Kaiba shook himself from his stupor and sneered.

"You really expect that cheap imitation of Ra to stop me?" He demanded. "I set these three cards face down, and play 'Emergency Provisions, which sends them all to the Graveyard, and gives me 3000 more Life Points! Now, Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragon, Neutron Blast!" The dragon on the left opened its mouth and fired the blue beam.

"Activate 'Rush Recklessly'!" Tea said. "This gives Hamon an extra 700 points for one turn, enough to turn the tables on your Blue Eyes!" The Neutron Blast hit Hamon (4700) who shook off the blow and chuckled darkly. "Hamon, counter-attack! Dark Lightning!" Hamon roared and held up a golden claw. A bolt of lightning struck from above into Hamon's palm, where it formed a glowing black ball. Hamon flung out its palm and sent a black beam towards the Blue Eyes. The black beam struck the dragon, and Kaiba shielded his eyes as it exploded, sending shockwaves across the field. The remaining two dragons roared in anger as their brother fell to the field and shattered. "And there's more, when Hamon destroys a monster, you take an additional 1000 damage Kaiba!"

-Tea: 3250, Kaiba: 2250-

"I'm not going to lose to you." Kaiba growled. "You may have held off my attack for a turn, but nest turn there'll be no escape!" Tea nodded.

"We'll see Kaiba. I flip up 'Magician of Faith' (300, 400), which lets me retrieve my Swords of Revealing Light, which I'm playing now!" The glowing swords rained down on the field, and Kaiba smirked.

"Stalling for time is a sign of weakness Gardner. Give it up."

"Not likely!" Tea said. "I know I have something in my deck to beat you. I just have to draw it. In the meantime, I end my turn." Kaiba drew and smiled.

"Alright then. I suppose you were only planning on facing my Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragons. But I'm not done with them yet. You'll soon learn, Gardner, that a creature of ultimate power like the Blue Eyes White Dragon cannot be defeated by a mere demon! I play 'Dimension Fusion'. It costs me 2000 Life Points, but now I can call forth all my monsters that have been removed from play. And since I removed them with Dragon's Mirror, come forth, 'Blue Eyes White Dragons' (3000, 2500)!" Kaiba's trademark monsters appeared alongside their Ultimate cousins. "I set these two cards down and end my turn."

"Alright." Tea said, drawing. "You called forth your Blue Eyes, but they won't be around for long! Hamon, Dark Lightning!" The demon roared and fired the bolt of electricity.

"Reveal 'Copy Spell'!" Kaiba command. A glowing sword shot out of the card and struck Hamon in the wing. The demon groaned and clutched the sword, the attack failing. "My Trap card transforms into a copy of one spell on your side of the field. And obviously, I'm copying your Swords of Revealing Light! If you want to go 3 turns with any attacks Gardner, you're going to do it right." Tea cringed.

"Alright, I'll set this card and end my turn." She said. Kaiba sneered.

"Good. Because its time to reveal yet another use for my Blue Eyes. Activate 'Ray of Hope'! This lets me return any 2 LIGHT monsters in my Graveyard to my deck. But, when used on a Fusion card, that card returns to the Fusion deck. Which means my Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragon is safe and sound, ready to be fused once again. Fused, by the old fashioned way. I play 'Polymerization', and fuse together my 3 Blue Eyes to bring back my third Ultimate Dragon!" The three single dragons combined together in a burst of light.

"I am getting really tired of those dragons." Tea said to herself.

"I'll end my turn there." Kaiba said. Tea drew.

"This may be what I need." She whispered. "I play 'Quick Draw Trap'. This lets me select any 3 Trap cards from my deck and place them on the field at a cost of half my Life Points. In return, those Trap can't be activated this turn." Kaiba snorted.

"Trap cards, more stalling. Maybe I should take a nap while you try and wait out your defeat." He sneered.

"I'm not stalling Kaiba. Observe. I place 'Gravity Bind', 'DNA Surgery', and 'Call of the Haunted' face down." Tea held up one more card. "Now, Hamon needed 3 Spell cards as Tributes. This monster requires 3 Traps! So I'll send the 3 Traps I just placed on the field to the Graveyard, to call forth my second Legendary Demon!" Hamon chuckled darkly as a winding red snake wove through the clouds above him. Kaiba stared.

"Slifer?" He roared. Tea sighed.

"You never did pay much attention to us Kaiba. This isn't Slifer, but I from the look, I suppose you can consider them distant cousins." A long red dragon dipped its head from the clouds and roared. "I call forth 'Uria, Lord of Searing Flames' (X000, X000)!" Uria, to Kaiba's shock, was a mirror image of Slifer the Sky Dragon. But where as Slifer had white markings, Uria's were pitch black.

"And now I activate Uria's special ability! Slifer gains power from the amount of cards in a player's hand. Uria gains its power from the Traps in my Graveyard!" Uria (4000, 4000) growled as bolts of energy coursed into it from Tea's Duel Disk. Kaiba looked down at his coat. The collar was beeping. Kaiba pressed the microphone hidden there.

"What, I'm busy!"

"Seto, something's wrong!" Mokuba replied. "I just got a call from Roland, there's something overloading the Duel Disk mainframe. We have to shut down the system and reboot it before it overloads! If that happens, all the Duel Disks in circulation will malfunction!" Kaiba growled and glared up at Uria and Hamon. Gardner was sure she could best his dragons with demons. His Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragons were going to crush her and her pathetic imitations of the God cards. And Mokuba expected him to pass up a chance like that?

"Shut down all Duel Disk servers except for mine and Tea Gardner's." Kaiba ordered. "Shunt all servers to sustain the remaining 2 Duel Disks. Don't let them shut down."

"But Seto..." Kaiba ignored Mokuba and looked up at Uria and Hamon.

" "Uria, Hamon, and the third Demon, no matter who he is, will al fall! My Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragons will destroy them!" Kaiba roared.

"We'll see Kaiba!" Tea shot back. "Now I activate the special ability of Uria. Uria, Flame Cannon!" Uria opened its mouth- unlike Slifer, it had only one- and fired a jet of rd-hot flames. "Fire!"

"You can't, my Copy Spell is preventing your attacks!" Kaiba shouted.

"You're almost right again. But who said I'm attacking your monsters! In exchange for not attacking at all, Uria can destroy one of your Spell or Trap cards." The flames struck Copy Spell, and the smoldering hologram of the card sizzled and burnt to a crisp. "That ends my turn."

-Tea: 1625, Kaiba: 250

"Although I hate to admit it, those Demons are powerful." Kaiba thought to himself. "They can't beat my Blue Eyes yet, but if she summons the third Demon…" By process of elimination, Kaiba knew the third Demon had to be a copy of Obelisk, the Tormentor. It had been a long time, but Kaiba remembered all too well the power Obelisk wielded. All of the Demon cards were twisted, evil versions of their God card counterparts. While Ra was a mighty winged dragon, Hamon was a sinister, golden skeletal figure. Slifer and Uria were both powerful red dragons, with Slifer commanding thunder and Uria commanding flame. But the Demon version –whatever it was called- of Obelisk…Kaiba had no idea what its powers were. But he intended to end the duel before he needed to know!

"Set them up, and I'll knock them down!" Kaiba snarled, drawing his card. "I place this card down and end my turn." Tea nodded.

"Okay Kaiba. You want it, so here it comes. I play 'Graceful Charity', to draw 3 cards and discard 2. And one of the cards I'm discarding is 'Angel's Wrath', a Trap card! Which means Uria now has 5000 attack points, enough to defeat your Ultimate Dragon and end this duel! Uria, attack! Flame Cannon!" Uria opened its mouth and summoned another glowing ball of red flame. "Destroy Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragon!" Kaiba growled.

"Activate 'Spirit Barrier'!" He commanded. "Now as long as one of my monsters remains in play, all damage to my Life Points becomes 0! Which means I'm safe from Uria's attack!" Uria fired and incinerated the Blue Eyes. Kaiba and Tea both gasped as sparks leapt up from their Duel Disks.

"No…" Kaiba whispered.

"Seto, we have to shut down the system!" Mokuba yelled. Kaiba growled.

"I will win this duel Mokuba, and nothing will stop me! The system will hold out!" The flaming dragon fell to its knees and collapsed, exploding in a plume of fire. A heat wave surged across the field in its wake.

"If you want to damage my Life Points, you'll have to destroy all 3 of my beasts!" Kaiba laughed. "And that's a task I sincerely doubt a cheerleader like you can handle." Tea growled. "In the meantime, my turn. I set this card down and end my turn. Your Swords of Revealing Light." Tea nodded.

"Okay. My move. Tea looked down at her card. "This might come in handy later, depending on what the third Demon is. For now, I can keep up my attack with Uria." "Uria, Flame Cannon! Destroy his second Ultimate Dragon!" Uria fired and burnt another Blue Eyes. Kaiba gritted his teeth and electricity leapt up from his cards. Tea looked down at her.

"Either I'm losing my mind, or my cards are glowing." Tea thought. Uria was glowing a faint red, and Hamon was glowing gold. And it also seemed like Uria was…pulsing, while it attacked. "The God cards may have been real, but they were meant to represent the real Gods of Egypts. These Demon cards may be counterparts, but they're just cards, they're not real like Slifer, Obelisk and Ra were." Tea assured herself and sighed. "I'll set a card face down and end my turn there." Kaiba smirked.

"Good. Because now I'm going to turn this entire duel around." He sneered. "I activate my trap 'Fiend Comedian'! Now, I can flip a coin and call it heads or tails. If I call it right, all the cards in your Graveyard are removed from play. And if I call it wrong, I have to discard cards from my deck equal to the cards in your Graveyard!" Tea gasped.

"If he calls it right, all the Traps in my Graveyard are removed! Uria will lose its attack power!" Tea gulped as a giant holographic coin appeared, and flipped into the air.

"I call heads!" Kaiba yelled. The coin spun in the air and landed. On tails. Tea let out a breath. "Don't relax yet Gardner. It really didn't matter what the result was, I still win. Now, I sacrifice my Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragon, in order to summon 'Blue Eyes Shining Dragon' (3000, 2500)!" Yugi gasped. Kaiba had only ever used that card once, and it was nearly unstoppable! The gleaming silver mechanical Blue Eyes hovered above the field as Kaiba laughed. "Now, my Blue Eyes Shining Dragon gains 300 attack points for each Dragon in my Graveyard." Kaiba smiled.

"There are already 7 in the Graveyard, and thanks to my Trap, I discarded 8 more Dragons from my deck. That's 15 Dragons, for a total of 4500 extra points!" Tea gaped at the shining dragon (7500, 2500) as sparks raced along its jaw. "It's been fun toying with you Gardner, but all good things come to an end. Blue Eyes Shining Dragon, Shining Neutron Blast!" The super-powered machine summoned a gigantic bolt of lightning into its mouth, and fired it full force at Hamon. The golden demon groaned and fell to the ground. Kaiba threw back his head and laughed.

"Game over Gardner! I win!" Kaiba laughed.

"Not yet Kaiba!" Tea snapped. "Activate 'Waboku'!" Kaiba gasped as the shining electric attack vanished in mid air.

"You're really starting to piss me off!" Kaiba snapped. "I'll set a card and my turn there." Tea nodded.

"You've got it." She looked down at her deck and stared. The top card was glowing a faint blue. "If it's glowing…then that means…" Tea drew her card and gasped. "The third Legendary Demon!" She whispered. She nodded and faced Kaiba. "I activate 'Flip Recall'. This lets me remove any monster in my Graveyard from play, and use its Flip effect at the cost of 1500 Life Points. And I'm using my Magician of Faith's effect to reactive 'Spell of Sanctity', and draw until we have 6 cards each."

"Now I play 'Raigeki', which destroys all your monsters!"

"I think not! I play 'Solemn Judgement', and pay half my Life Points to negate and destroy that Spell!" Kaiba yelled.

-Tea: 125, Kaiba: 125-

"I figured you would have a counter ready. Kaiba, you really need to learn how to take a bluff. I play 'Martyr of Phantasm'. This card can only be activated when I control 3 of the Legendary Demons, and calls on 3 'Phantom Demon' tokens. And they're the monsters that will end this duel once and for all!"

"Really? How are 3 monster tokens going to do that?" Kaiba mocked.

"They'll do it because I'm sacrificing them!" I sacrifice my three tokens to summon the third and most powerful of the Legendary Demons!" Electricity raced along Tea's Duel Disk. The cheerleader went to place the card on the disk, and gasped as a bolt of lightning struck from the sky, hitting the disk. Tea screamed as lightning coursed through her body. The third Demon card in her hand pulsed and flung itself out of her grasp, flying into the air.

"TEA!" Yugi screamed, running to her. Tea groaned and collapsed to the ground. Yugi turned her over and felt for a pulse. "Thank god." He gasped, finding one. Yugi looked up and froze. His gaze slowly panned down to Tea's arm. Her Duel Disk was fried. Short circuited by the lightning. It was just a piece of metal now, unable to project anything. And yet…

Hamon and Uria still floated in the skies above…

- - - - - - - - - -

In an alley a few feet away, the third Legendary Demon card slid to the ground. A black boot stepped out of the shadows near it, before the boot's owner kneeled down to pick the card.

"Well well well, seems the cheerleader wasn't ready for this kind of power." Rochelle said to herself. "I suppose in her condition, she won't be needing this anymore." Looking up at Yugi cradling Tea, Rochelle smiled. "Goodbye Tea. You shall not be missed." Rochelle laughed and slipped the Demon into her pocket before melting back into the darkness…

To be continued…