Well, as I said in the description:

SPOILERS TO 145 + ahead!

This will be a piece similar to Mistakes (for those who have read that) as in I will be posting a chapter before each new episode, so I won't know what's happening other than Janime descriptions. Basically, it's my take on what I think will happen, or more accurately, what I'd like to happen.

It won't be very long, or if there are several chapters, it is likely they will be split up in this size... but it's me, famous for looooooong chapters, so we'll see.

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Yugioh 5ds.

Hope

Arc Cradle

Third Person's POV

What still remained drummed against his swelling heart in the wasteland of his victory, flooding him with that last glimpse he would share in that elusive world of speed. Darkness caved into the lure and power of white light, and the final scream of a dying friend carried him back into the twisted version of reality that was the Arc Cradle. Whether the numbness gripping his body or sudden change in gravity was to blame, he felt his D-Wheel hitch below him.

Soaring through the air, he entertained the brief thought of a similar duel in the past, before he came crashing to the floor, rolling unorthodoxly on the smooth surface. Bones and skin protested to the violent greeting, and his stomach flinched as if expecting another shard of metal to rent space there.

Though roughed up, the pain went unnoticed. It was something else entirely that set the deep lines in his brow and the bitter clench in his jaw. Everything about and within him ached, all parts demanding too much attention in the all-consuming misery that wracked him. Slowly, his palms kissed the floor and lifted him upwards.

He wore the mask once again.

There was nothing left to say as he looked out into the Planetary Gear's space, no black holes or meteor showers, no dying stars, and no distant ghosts of a doomed future to call out to. The only color left in such a dark, gray setting was the dull crimson on his D-Wheel. Seeking life, he took a step forward, but fell short.

There, beside the cold metal of the machine they had rebuilt together, lay another splash of brightness. Yet the warm orange tint in that visor hit him with a wave of blue so powerful, even the mask he had spent his Satellite-ridden life constructing couldn't survive. The visage of the man who had worn them plagued him, smashed into him, contorted him, and he felt every muscle in his body tense against any fleeting wish of composure he held.

Closing his eyes against the pain of losing a friend to such a senseless means, every fiber of his being trembled and clenched; leaving no room for hollow anger in sorrow's wake. The muscles in his face screwed up, his throat shrunk and burned like rubber set alight, and his unseen eyes stung with the weight of clinging to what he did not have.

A tear fell with his name from his lips.

"Bruno!"

Planetary Particle

Third Person's POV (continued)

"Zone!"

From his vantage point, the man inside the machine gazed down stoically. An unsettling nerve twisted in Yusei's gut that had nothing to do with Bruno's death at such a sight. Bizarrely mixed nostalgia, irony, and recognition prevented him from progressing any further, so he pressed on with the words he owed to the fallen. "We've shut down the 3 Planetary Particle Gears in spite of the challenges you've given us."

Though he had no physical way of knowing this, a blind faith in his friends and a warm assurance from his mark gave him validation. "Your intent may be pure, but your means are cruel and manipulative! You used Bruno with the knowledge that he would have to betray his friends and that he could die as a result! Sherry as well—did you tell her you could revive her parents? If you could truly raise the dead then you wouldn't be here in this timeline! Your mission is based on deceit and false hope and I will stop you here!"

"Antimony."

Pulse fluctuating in betrayal, he muttered, "What?"

"His name was Antimony and he died long before your duel with him." The words were frigid as they brushed across his cheeks, leaving him unnerved at the impartial remark about someone who was supposedly Zone's close friend. Mouth falling open and closed in an uncharacteristic display of rage, the man continued, "You know nothing yet, Yusei."

"Nothing?" he challenged with a shaking, but raised, fist. "I know enough. I know that whether or not he was just a memory, Bruno was—is my friend, and that is a bond will transcend your lies, just as he did in the end! I know that your future came to be, and that you believe destroying Neo Domino will remedy that! I know I can't stand by and let you do that—the ends do not justify those means! I know that I will stop you!"

With the anaphora over, both fell victim to stony silence, peering into the other's soul with intensity alarming and familiar. Skin crawling, Yusei was the first to break it. Although he had been knocked off-balance by the way Zone sat atop a pile of junk like a throne in a way that had once been common to his days before the war, it was something else entirely that recaptured his attention, the echoing sound of heavy feet bounding through the empty room.

Had his friends caught up?

As he turned, he felt feelings flee from his heart, chased away by the Ghost that refused to stop haunting him. "Zone!"

Vaguely, Yusei wondered how many times he could be shocked witless before his heart gave out on him. "Aporia? But—I—?"

The mammoth of a specimen spared him a curious glance, pausing in his approach to size the duelist up. Yusei's hands came up defensively, inching towards his duel disk for the fight about to come. Seeing this creature tower over him on a D-Wheel had been one thing, something he could fight in the least, but now standing under his immense height and glowing eyes, Yusei knew he stood no chance if the robot simply decided to swipe at him with a clawed hand. Yet he didn't make a move, just stared at him.

Red and blue eyes stayed locked on each other, one in almost faint curiosity and the other in venom.

"So," Aporia began, tilting his head towards one of the three paths that opened to the center gear. That inhuman gaze sliced back to the young man and almost seemed to grin to himself. "Is this the face of hope then, Zone?"

Before Yusei could so much as raise an eyebrow to the comment, Aporia had shifted his attention to the friend he had vowed to protect and activated his duel disk. The last survivor said nothing, though the silence spoke volumes between the two as it often did between age old friends. Without the dead weight of words to spare, he activated his own duel disk and drew five cards.

Aporia's smile grew and squashed the question bursting on Yusei's lips. "I should have known you expected this, my old friend."

Sapphire eyes darted between the two of them, at a loss now that his target had been stolen from him. Unaccustomed to sitting on the sidelines and blown away that it was the man who had tried to kill him nearly two hours ago that had a change of heart, he could do little more than stare in open-mouthed shock. Wildly, a distracted thought danced across his hectic mind, wondering, Did Sherry mean I would die of shock?

Then, catching himself, his face twisted into a horrible imitation of normalcy as Zone finally decided to speak to his General. "If memory serves," Zone replied gently, the only infliction in his voice heard tonight, "the Signers changed many hearts before their deaths. It was plausible that they would reach yours as well."

A laugh darted into the open, warm and far more human that Yusei would have given the machine credit for. "Is that it, my friend?"

"Why are you doing this?" Yusei demanded suddenly, reviving at the eerie comfort of a laugh and the distant chill of death. "I thought you were allies."

The fondness in his eyes when Aporia addressed him raised the nausea of confusion once more, the entire situation digging under his skin like frozen nails. "Yusei, you will understand through this duel." Sensing the discomfort from the young man he had tried to kill just seemed to make the smile brighter, and the laughter was softer. "You will know hope soon enough."

"Hope?" he echoed, floored once more. Knowingly, Aporia returned his attention to Zone, who had not moved from atop his junk throne. "Your friends seem to look to you for that, but you have very little to spare for yourself. Watch this duel, and perhaps I can lend you what Zone has given me."

What he's…? Yusei frowned.

"My old friend, my savior, the God of Destiny… Zone! Let us duel for an end, let us be consumed by hope!"

"Duel!"

The accustomed standoff between the two combatants did not last long, however, as Fate was feeling especially creative in the bleak echoes of this tragedy. "Yusei!"

All three men turned in unison, each frustrated in a different way about the intrusion. However, it was both difficult and ill advised to ignore Jack Atlas when he called for you. The din from the Planetary Particle's Core had drowned the approaching engine out, but the white D-Wheel blazed into existence with little heed for its stealth. Rua and Ruca clung to each arm of the Wheel of Fortune on their boards as Jack braked hard, taking in the unusual sight with a hint of confusion. "Aporia? But we defeated you!"

As the man opened his mouth to answer the question burning in the back of Yusei's throat, he was interrupted once more by three new arrivals.

"Jack! Yusei! Rua! Ruca!"

Aki, Crow, and Sherry entered with the calls, each dismounting quickly to check up on the others. The Signers stopped at the sight of Yusei on the sidelines of a death-match between friends, but Sherry strode ahead until she was right before Yusei, who tensed considerable, the threat she had made lingering over his head.

Their mistrusting eyes met and lingered, broken when Sherry lurched forward in a quick bow and remained so. "What I said and acted on were unforgivable, and I will not blame a man I know nothing about for them."

Emerald irises cut upwards to glare into their sapphire counterparts, and she continued, half threateningly, half righteously, "No man can make up my mind for me. I chose to believe what was obviously a lie, and I have spat on my parent's memory because of it. If I am going to kill you"—Aki made a noise of protest—"then it will be on my own terms. Not the lies of a false prophet."

The situation and stage for such an apology were inappropriate at best, but the brute power the woman held in her gaze was enough to force him to set it aside. Palm outwards, he held out a hand to her, recoiling internally at the fact that this hand had already failed tonight. She eyed it like a snake ready to bite, somehow sensing the uncertainty in his offering.

"Sherry," he had her attention now, although whether the fact was good was debatable, "I want you on our team."

Tense atmosphere evaporating entirely with the soft jab, she covered something like grateful sorrow with a wry smirk. Their hands met in a firm shake and separated quickly, as if they lingered their skin would burn through the gloves. In unison, the pair turned back towards the duel, Yusei suffocating the impulse to apologize for the interruption—a habit instilled by Martha. His foster mother's smeared Aporia's satisfied face: thick brown strands and worn, dark eyes. Sparing a wishful thought for her and the kids' safety, he hardened his resolve and fisted his loose hands. For them, for his friends, for Neo Domino, and for Bruno's sacrifice—all these things left to lose or were already lost.

"I will show you all then!" Aporia shouted, the smile fading into the harsh lines of his face, swinging a clawed hand towards the confused gaggle of duelists. Tenderly, the hand retreated to his chest and cupped around his heart, the nails trailing along his jumpsuit idly. "I will not show you the despair that trapped me, but the hope Zone has given me—the hope you Signers have shown me!"

"The hope that we…?" Ruca repeated, glancing at the heart burned onto Rua's arm in recognition. She brought her hands across her small chest in prayer, offering her brother a smile. "Rua."

Sheepish confusion lit up his features, and, turning towards the silent Yusei, he felt the need to ask, "So you'll defeat Zone for us?"

The underlying being: So Yusei won't die in the end?

Two eyebrows narrowed, dangerously close to touching. All power dripped down into a menacing tone, as if the suggestion was clear ludicrously and insulting. "Make no mistake. I believe in Zone as much as you believe in Yusei."—the lingering of red eyes made the addressed uncomfortable again, it was as if the man was dropping ambiguous hints for him, preparing him for something—"I will not win this duel, of that I have no doubt."

"Then why…?" Rua gasped as Crow and Aki shared a disbelieving look.

"There is something he needs me to understand," Yusei answered, trouble gracing his face in place of his usual stoic façade. The appearance sent his friends widening eyes and parting lips, but one glance in his iron eyes settled them down, recognizing that look from the previous war they had won. It was Aki who first remembered when he had adopted that look and the circumstances behind it, although the others were not far behind her in their conclusions, she was the only one to voice such a dangerous notion.

"Yusei…" Aki spoke, gently and quietly as if afraid of scaring him off. "Where is Dark Glass?"

He turned away.

End Notes

Did anyone else fight back tears when Yusei cried? I was sniffling in my dorm...

So, the usual questions:

1) Anything you don't understand (although most things will be explained as times goes on)?

2) Believable?

3) Am I the only one who actually wants Yusei to die?

Thanks for reading as always!

AxJfan