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The perfect team

Chapter 14: Showdown

"Ah, there it is!" Bakura exclaimed. "The judgment of the pharaoh's soul. And his queen's of course. Finally, I found the holy tablet that holds the name of that insufferable goody-two-shoes!"

"We found it. Without me you still wouldn't have a clue about it. Not to mention, you can't even read the symbols carved there. You were a mere thief after all, and the Pharaoh's name has been written in a highly sophisticated form of the old Egyptian language." Bakura growled at the insult. Behind him Marik stepped out of the shadows.

A chuckle was heard:

"I suspected you would come here. After all, you always were a power- hungry lunatic, Bakura. And it's a pleasure to meet your acquaintance. I'm sorry, I didn't get your name…"

Calmly leaning against the wall at the entrance was Yugi…

"You!" Bakura spat.

"Didn't you say he was dead? Blown up into a million pieces, you incompetent little piece of shit?!" Marik snarled at his partner, while taking a few steps away from him.

"But he was…" Bakura whined pathetically. The white-haired tomb robber couldn't understand what was happening. He had seen to Yugi's demise himself not so long ago. He'd stood inside the building when it exploded. The fact that he was just a spirit occupying another body protected him from any damage, but Yugi… He had been very much alive when the bomb had blown up! So how could he be standing just a few meters away, seizing them up with his cautious gaze.

"Yeah, obviously this is his ghost standing there in the door…" the other man said sarcastically.

"I can assure you, I'm neither a ghost nor a lost soul wandering around, looking for a way into afterlife. I'm very much alive and intend to keep it that way. So, if you would put all your weapons down and surrender yourself to me… Oh, wait, I meant us. That would be nice."

"Us?" both men asked increduously.

"Yes. Us." Came the answer from a tall man beside them. His cold blue eyes blazing with rage as a little 'click' alerted the men that he released the safety catch of his gun. Slowly rising from the ground he had been waiting on, the man made his way into the light.

"Kaiba." Yugi nodded his hello.

"Miss me?" the brown-haired man asked with a smirk in return.

"Not really. I could've waited a little while longer before facing you again, but the company isn't very good, so…"

"Let's get rid of them, then!" Kaiba suggested, choosing to ignore Yugi's insolent comment for the moment. But after everything that would be said and done…

'There will be hell to pay for that little 'slip' of the tongue…' Yugi grimaced. 'Ah, whatever. We're probably not going to make it, so there is nothing to be afraid of, I guess.'

At this point everyone drew his weapons.

"I'll take the white-haired one!" the King of Games said.

"Funny. I was going to say the same." Kaiba replied.

It was like some sort of signal for everyone. No words were needed afterwards as they dashed forward, lashing out at each other or jumped a few meters to the side to shoot. Bakura and Marik stood back-to-back, facing the two most feared assassins in the world. They wouldn't give up easily, and they knew they had as good a chance of winning this as the other two had.

In addition to his gun, Kaiba had pulled a sword out of his coat, one similar to Yugi's. The Kind of Games didn't dare throw the knives he would normally use, for fear of hitting Kaiba, if both Bakura and Marik dodged. So instead of his usual long-distance attack, he chose to make good use of Tea's last Christmas gift: a pair of sais, which were basically a pair of daggers each with three, in this case, sharpened blades. If you knew how to use them and were ambidextrous, you could utilize them for both attack and defense. Now Yugi might not've been as great as Tea or even Serenity with these type of weapons, but he wasn't an amateur, either. He would give Bakura a hard time, for said thief used knives like him and it was easy to block his attacks. Unfortunately for the King of Games, however, Bakura didn't need to be considerate about not hurting his partner, who was at his back, so he threw his knives to keep Yugi at a distance.

"If he keeps this up, sooner or later he will be out of weapons. That will be my chance." Yugi thought. "I can be patient, Bakura. I'll just wait… Let's just hope Seto can keep up that long. We don't know anything about this Marik guy. I don't want any casualties--well, at least no more than absolutely necessary."

(Scene Change)

"I'm not going(this is the phrase you usually use when threatening others) to repeat myself: she wasn't joking. Surrender or die! I'm in no mood for any of your stupid little games." Jaden said again, before he raised the knife in his hand to one of the remaining men's throats. Slowly, the men let go of their weapons. One after another they laid them down onto the ground and kicked them towards Alexis, who collected them hastily. Then, Jaden took out a rope and handed it his girlfriend. After quickly tying them up, she walked over to Jaden and hugged him fiercely. Jaden looked a little dumbfounded for a moment, scratching his head in embarrassment as his cheeks reddened. He got over it quickly, though, as he returned the embrace lightly. He then proceeded to lift Alexis chin upwards to give her a hot, passionate kiss, to which she responded in kind.

"Okay, okay, before you rip off your clothes right here, let's go find the others. This is not over yet!" Tea scolded them playfully. She wouldn't mind a little passionate kissing and groping with her husband right now either.

Speaking of which…

"Where's Yugi?" she asked the very flustered-looking couple. Not only had Tea seen them passionately make out twice by now, they seemed to be desperate enough to forget they had an audience of enemies who had just tried to kill them. Alexis seemed especially embarrassed, while a smug smile was suddenly forming on Jaden's lips. "And how did you get done so quickly?"

"Oh, well…" the Slifer replied, fidgeting a little under her scrutinizing gaze. "I activated the major trap we set up with one of my daggers…"

"Yes?" Tea asked, exasperated.

"Remember that 'boom'?" Jaden asked. Tea's eyes widened a little. She was having that awful feeling in her stomach again, that… "That was the explosive we put underground. As soon as my dagger hit them, they…well, blew up."

"I knew it." Tea thought angrily, but out loud she just replied, "Well, that figures, I guess. My husband always had a liking for big fireworks. But where is he? Why isn't he here with you? He isn't…? Not again."

"No, no. He's fine. He had already headed off when I activated the trap though, so I really can't say where to… Sorry."

"Don't be. He's like that. Well, we should go back to the castle and see if everything is okay with your friends there. Let's go."

'Besides, I have the feeling that we'll find our answers there, too.'

(Scene Change)

Seven minutes later…

"Seems like everything is going according to plan. The enemy is retreating already. Joey, Tristan and the others are almost done with their battle!"Hassleberry informed them.

"So, there is nothing more to do?" Alexis asked suspiciously. "We've won?"

"Not exactly."

"What else is there, if the enemy is fleeing from us?" Jaden questioned. That was lesson number one material. If the opponent dies, is knocked out or flees, it's over. What could there possibly be left to do, if there was no one to fight?

"Well… Bastion and I got this weird alarm. We tried to take a look through the cameras, but wherever that alarm came from, there are none."

"And then?"

"It went off again."

"What?"

"You heard me. Bastion is trying to find out where that alarm came from, but it could take a while. So, I guess you all can just sit down and wait for the others to finish their business."

"Okay."

"In that case… Tea, do you have some interesting story you wanna share…" Jaden started, but trailed off as he noticed the brown-haired woman wasn't there anymore. "…with us."

"Where did she run off to?"

However, Jaden couldn't finish that thought, because at that exact moment, Joey burst through the door with the rest of the group trailing behind him. All the while he was dragging a young and obviously unconscious man with him. The man had spiky blond hair and an angular face that didn't quite seem to fit his age. He was tall and well built, as his shirt clung rather tightly to his body. Over the shirt the man wore a black coat that seemed to be from a horror movie. All his clothes were of the same dark colour, which made him look a little surreal, but it was very practical for hiding in the dark.

"Better than a bright red jacket anyway!" the Slifer Red concluded, looking down at his pretty much torn-up clothes.

"Who's that?" Bastion asked out of nowhere.

"His name's Rafael. He was commanding the swarm of attackers where we were. Thought we'd bring him here for a little interrogation!" Joey answered. "The other two - or rather three, if you count that little wench in, the one Jaden forgot in the forest - are down in the dungeons."

"And interrogation means…"

"Torture. Or drugs." Mai simply stated. "Tie him to the chair, would you, darling?"

And Joey did just that. He moved the unconscious blond over to the free chair Pegasus had left earlier, when he went to help down in the tunnels. Upon arriving at his destination, Yugi's best friend slammed this Rafael into the seat as hard as he could. The little group heard a crack as a few ribs seemed to break, not that anyone cared. Duke walked over to him, the rope in his hands. Hastily, but thoroughly they tied him to the metallic chair.

"There you go, honey." Joey proclaimed as Mai approached and kissed her on the cheek.

"Please, could you two do the sweet-talking later? We still don't know where Bakura is and I want this done first!" Serenity sighed. Everyone else sniggered. It was a rather uncommon sight to see the young woman scold her big brother, since she adored him so much.

(Scene Change)

The fight had been going on for a good half hour, but it seemed like an eternity. All four fighters were exhausted, since they were all on the highest alert for the entire fight. They all knew that their opponents weren't to be taken lightly, so they needed to be 100 percent concentrated at all the time. Their muscles were tense, ready to jump at the slightest movement of their enemies' hands. The room was deadly silent, after Seto had thrown away his gun after the last bullet had been shot. You had to give him credit, though. Seven times out of twelve he had hit his opponent. Marik was wounded in both of his legs, his abdomen and one shoulder. Because of this, Kaiba had a slight advantage, since he could still use both of his arms, while Marik was limited to the left one.

The other two shots, however, got Yugi in his ribcage. The tri-coloured-haired man was clutching his wound with his left hand, a sai lying forgotten on the floor. Silently cursing Kaiba for using his gun in such a situation, he and Bakura circled each other. By now, the thief and his partner had given up on standing back to back, especially since Seto did make use of his gun. They didn't think it wise to stay so close together after that, especially after Kaiba's bullet missed its intended target and hit Yugi instead.

'Damn you, Seto!' Yugi cursed again as Bakura, with an evil smirk plastered on his face, lunged forward again. "Right, left, middle, middle, right, middle, left, left, parry…" The King of Games silently told himself as he dodged every one of the tomb robber's fast attacks. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see that Seto was in a similar position. He, too, was wounded. The cuts, where Marik had landed a blow with his Egyptian swords, were deep and still bleeding, Clothes torn, Kaiba had already disregarded his coat and his shirt was nothing more than a stripe of black textile, glistening a little with all the blood on it. Suddenly Bakura lashed out at him and this time, Yugi couldn't stop it. He had been too distracted with seeing Seto smirk triumphantly as his katana sliced Marik's hand. Marik let go of his last weapon with a pain-filled cry, but soon enough pulled out a knife to stab Seto.

Yugi wanted to shout, wanted to yell and warn Seto as Bakura's knife made its way through his chest, intending to hit his heart. The last thing the Kind of Games saw was the grimace of victory on the face of this psychopath that was Bakura, the tomb robber.

The last thing Yugi heard was the white-haired man's triumphant cry:

"It's over, pharaoh, and this time for good."

Then, the world went dark…

(Scene Change)

"No!" Joey's voice cut through the shocked silence. Mai had just finished her impressive, though very, very scary work on Rafael. They knew now what Bakura and his partner, a man named Marik, wanted. "The Tablet of Judgment is a holy artifact. How can you even think about stealing its secrets and destroying it?! Have you no respect for the dead, you…you selfish, little…"

"It's okay, Joey! Serenity interfered, before one blonde could break the other's neck.

"Your sister is right, Joey. We should go stop them, instead of beating him into a bloody pulp." Duke agreed as he ran out of the room. "Though we can do that later, if you still want to!" he added to the blonde's amusement.

"Okay!" Joey agreed. "But someone has to stay here and watch him. Mokuba, the Ishtar siblings and Pegasus are already looking after the others down in the dungeon. So, who stays here with Rafael?"

"We will!" Bastion and Hassleberry offered after exchanging looks.

"Okay. Take care and don't leave him out of your sight!" Yugi's best friend admonished, already halfway out the door, where the others were waiting for him. "Let's hurry. I don't like the idea of Yugi fighting those two psychobitches all alone."

"He isn't alone. Kaiba's with him." Mai reminded him.

"Yeah. That's what's worrying me most."

Everyone just shook his or her heads. The world could end and Joey Wheeler would use his last minutes to argue with a certain brown-haired CEO.

Of that, they were all sure.

"In that case: less talking, more running!" Alexis scolded as they practically flew down staircase after staircase. Some, such as Joey, went even as far as to jump into the space between all the staircases and let themselves fall two floors into the basement. Serenity wanted to hurry to her brother and ask if he was okay, Mai wanted to scream at him "ARE YOU CRAZY?!", and Tristan and Duke wanted to throttle the blond for scaring their beloved Serenity like this… But all was quickly forgotten at the sight before them:

Yugi was on the ground, quickly bleeding to death--if he even was still alive that is. Tea was kneeling by him, pulling his hand onto her knees, crying and silently pleading that he wouldn't die. Seto was also kneeling by Yugi pushing a piece of cloth on the wound to stop the bleeding. His gun and katana, as well as Tea's bow had been thrown into the room carelessly as they were too preoccupied with their dying husband/friend-rival. Behind them lay Bakura, an arrow sticking out from his mouth (however Tea had done that, would remain a mystery forever). A few meters farther away was another man. Platinum blonde hair fanned around his head, contrasting with his tanned skin. It was Marik, and though he didn't seem to have any life-threatening injuries, his body lay completely still. Lifeless.

"What happened here?" Jaden inquired, being the first one to come out of the shock.

"After a while I finally got Marik with my sword." Seto answered. At the questioning stares he moved to hold the weapon up a little: It was drenched in poison.

"Oh."

"Yugi, being the nice guy he is, tried to warn Seto…" And at this, Tea sent the man a glare that made shivers run down everyone's spine. "…about the knife Marik had pulled out with the last of his last strength. He was so distracted, he let his guard down. Bakura took advantage of it and stabbed him. I shot the bastard before he could rip Yugi's heart out, but I don't know if Yugi will make it. He's been unconscious since then."

"He will make it!" Jaden said suddenly. Everyone looked at him with a dubious gaze, so he added, "I believe in Yugi. He won't die and leave Tea alone. He loves her. That's why I was invincible even as all those men came at me: I, too, have someone waiting for me." He gave a meaningful glance in Alexis' direction. She blushed a little. "I'm sure Yugi won't die. I believe in him. And you should, too. Because sometimes, you can only achieve something if someone believes in you. And of course, if you believe in yourself… A friend told me that once."

"So, you say everything will be alright and we'll go back to our normal lives?" Joey asked, because he was his typical oblivious self.

"Not that our lives are normal in the least." Duke reminded.

They laughed. Even Seto Kaiba chuckled.

(Scene Change)

Years after…

"Thank you, Syrus." Thought a brown-haired man as he sat on the balcony of his penthouse apartment years later. "Thanks to you, I could believe in myself and others. And also thanks to you, everyone believed that Yugi would get betterAnd so he did. It was all thanks to you that I lead a nice, calm life nowadays." He chuckled. Usually you wouldn't call a killer's life calm, but he couldn't think of any other word to describe it with. He had a beautiful wife, three wonderful, if a little hyperactive, children and a job he was not only good at but also enjoyed. He missed his friends that had fallen in combat--Bastion, for example, and Tristan. They had died during some riots a man named Sartorius had caused. They had given their lives to save the planet from total domination as well as many others had in that time. Aster Phoenix, a duelist expert Jaden had hardly known at that time, but who had some issues with Sartorius after finding out the man had used him. Chazz Princeton, though he and Judai had a bitter rivalry, they became friends over the years, too. His death pained Judai, though he didn't cry for him like he had cried for Fubuki Tenjoin, Asuka's older brother, whom Judai had come to see like his own brother.

"What are you thinking about, darling?" came Asuka's voice from behind him. Before he could turn around, she had encircled his waist with her arms, her hands fisted in the front of his shirt.

"So many of our friends have died over the past years. Actually, more like they died altogether nine years ago."

"Sartorius?" Asuka asked, though she knew the answer. "Is he bothering you again? Have you had nightmares again?"

"I always have nightmares when you're not lying beside me, preferably naked."

It was meant as a joke, she knew. But she was in a playful mood, so she went along: "Yeah, well, I had an urgent mission to complete… sorry darling… but tonight, I'm all yours!"

"Is that so?" he asked, a mischievous gleam in his eyes.

"Yes." She admitted, blushing. How she could still blush after all those years and three children…who knew? Judai didn't care much about the answer; he only knew that he found it adorable. And that it made her even sexier in his eyes.

"Well, in that case… I'll take full advantage of you!" he laughed and scooted her up into his arms.

End of The Perfect Team!

A/N: Well, this is the end. The story is finished, but I still got something to say :

First of all, a big, big virtual COOKIE to my beta: celebistar AKA TFRiD Quenn! Thank you very much for helping me and being patient with me! And of course thank you for your offer to help me again with future stories. Das ist toll von dir und wenn du jemals einen Beta für deutsche Stories brauchst, sag bescheid!

Furthermore I want to thank all my readers and reviewers (does that word even exist?). I hope you had as much fun reading my story as I had writing it. Maybe we'll read each other again in the future?

See you!

Mayet