17 Chapter 17: Assault in the Night.

As the agents of New Order surrounded the warehouse, their actions did not go unnoticed.

Beneath that same warehouse, in a fortified command operations bunker, their actions were under watch on a dozen large screen monitors. The various computer analysts inside the operations centre were getting nervous, this was their sanctuary, their base of operations. And they were surrounded.

How had they even been found?

This was a base of the Black Elite, the most secret branch of City Security.

This shouldn't be happening.

Worried chatter filled the room and panic was starting to set in.

"Enough!" came a sharp cry.

Silence fell across the room at command of their Captain as she entered. She had long black hair with a purple tinted fringe and was dressed in a white business suit with a pink blouse and purple underskirt. She was one Shark was after. Captain Dextra of the Black Elite.

Her expression was calm, focused, cold. Like an ice queen on her throne, looking down at her subjects with her steely gaze. Her familiar presence restored order to the room.

Her focus remained on the monitors as several dozen masked men blocked off all the exits from the warehouse and another couple of dozen seemed to be gathering to make a frontal assault. Although the Black Elite was the best of the best, a crack team created to carry out the orders of Mayor Heartland and Dr Faker, it was also a small team. Spread across several bases like this one.

Apart from the support staff, the number of enforcement officers Dextra had with her that she could rely on numbered less than two dozen.

They were badly outnumbered.

"Have you reached Captain Nistro or Lieutenant Gorn yet?" she asked the communication officer on duty.

"No Captain, we have lost all outside communication. Landline, network, even the radio is being jammed."

"New…Order…" Dextra tested the name on her tongue.

It had only been earlier this afternoon when she had received a data packet from above, detailing the information Kite had obtained about a secret underground organisation with a mysterious power.

Her orders had been to investigate and get to the bottom things. To think that before she could even make a move that they had brought themselves right to her door. It had to be New Order, all the masks these guys wore were plain and flat full matt black masks without any decoration or feature. Save one.

A neon green unicursal hexagram inscribed in a circle on the forehead. A match to the images she had received of what was known as The Seal of Orichalcos.

No matter the reason why, since they were here now then they might as well stay. Dextra refused to believe a bunch of amateurs could pose a real threat to her trained elite. She turned on her communicator.

"Teams A and B prepare to move out, equip riot suppression gear and set up position at the entrance to block 1. Team C on standby at block 3 and load with lethal rounds. Prepare for breach."

She wanted to see just what this New Order was capable of, however what she saw next exceeded all her wildest imaginings.

---

"So now we have them trapped, just what do you plan on doing?" Shark, the new General of Order, General Blue of the New Order asked his fellow General, Wyvern the Black General.

This operation had a personal importance to him and he was eager to get on with it, to have a taste of the revenge that was promised him, however at the moment he was but a spectator. He had no idea how New Order planned to proceeded.

They had surrounded the warehouse that was there target, but he saw no sign of any heavy equipment or explosives. So how where they planning on breaking into the warehouse? Knock and ask nicely? The windows were barred, the doors and shutters made of reinforced steel and the walls were thick concreate. It didn't look like it at first glance but the building was a veritable fortress.

*Humph*

"I know you have only been with us a short time, but you are about to see a glimpse of true power. So be quite and watch boy." She replied.

Shark was angry at the disrespect that he was shown. New or not he was now a General of New Order and for him to be treated like this in front of all these subordinates was an insult. Tightly clenching his fists he just wanted to punch that pretty face in, but he remembered his instructions.

If he wanted his revenge then he had to follow his orders. For now.

At a signal from Wyvern the New Order agents activated their duel disks and summoned a host of monsters, they were all gigantic brown skinned brutes wearing studded leather battle harnesses and purple loincloths like barbarians. With red eyes, a bulbous head and a spiked collar around their necks, they howled and roared like mad beasts.

If Drake was here then he would recognise them as the weapon of the foot soldiers of the Orichalcos, the monster Orichalcos Gigas.

But Shark was confused.

What good was it to summon an army of virtual monsters? They had no true form or mass, no substance or strength. Even the mysterious Number Cards usually only had a limited effect on the duellists and the environment during a duel, and these were no Number cards. They could no more effect the real world than a illusion. They…!!!

Sharks thoughts were instantly scattered as he watched one of these so-called images put its fist right through the steel door in front of it like a child punching through wet tissue paper. He couldn't believe his eyes, nor could Dextra and the rest of the Black Elite watching the scene on the monitors.

Watching his disbelief Wyvern couldn't help but laugh at the boy's naivety.

"What? You thought that we recruit duellists for fun? This is the true power of the Orichalcos, of New Order. Imagine it, armies of monsters marching through the streets with real power, real strength, destroying everything in their path. What army could stand against a force like this in the hundreds, the thousands. And these are but mere foot soldiers. When the time comes and the Great Beast descends to lead us no force on Earth will be able to stop us." Wyvern proudly declared.

As she spoke the rest of the Gigas had already begun to attack, they punched holes in the walls, ripped the bars from the windows and crushed the doors in their grasp like playthings. They forced themselves inside making their ways deeper and deeper into the base.

"Open Fire!" a cry rang out.

Suddenly the Gigas were met with a barrage of rubber bullets, canisters of tear gas and blasts of sonic waves. They had found the enemy, and they were weak.

The Gigas didn't pause or stop, they just continued their unstoppable advance.

---

"What kind of monster are those?!"

"That's impossible!"

"They're not stopping!"

Cries of panic filled the control room once more as Dextra tried to control the situation. These monsters were walking through a storm of suppression that would floor any normal force. The rubber bullets bounced of their skin like the tickling of mosquitos, the sonic cannons were like an annoying buzz to their ears and the tear gas was no more than a harmless mist to these beasts.

"Teams A & B fall back to armoury, equip lethal rounds and bring up the heavy artillery, Team C move to cover the withdraw. Set up a kill box at block 4." She ordered.

At first like everyone else she had been stunned at the fact that duel monsters could be summoned with physical form as they broke their way in. But she quickly regained her cool. If they had form then that meant they could be destroyed. Riot suppression gear was obviously useless, but let's see how they handle real fire power.

As the march of the monsters reached the fourth block the waiting Team C let loose with full automatic fire of their assault rifles. The monsters didn't even try to dodge, taking the full force of the hail of bullets without flinching.

They might as well have been firing blanks for all the effect it had.

"Grenades!"

*BOOM!*

"Hurrah!" came a cheer in the operation centre as finally one of the beasts went down to the explosion. But the cheers of hope soon turned to cries of despair. The fallen monster seemed dissipate into motes emerald light but then that light transformed into a ring of light on the floor and from it rose a new beast.

It looked as good as new, in fact it seemed to actually be even stronger than the beast that had just fallen. Taller, larger, more fearsome. With an angry roar it hurled itself towards the ant like existences in front it.

These monsters were unkillable, unstoppable. And then the dying began.

---

"Arrgh!"

Sharks face paled at the sounds coming from the front, explosions, gunfire and screams. He felt sick as he followed behind the unaffected Wyvern and her subordinates. Everywhere they passed only destruction was left behind, bullet holes, craters, holes and piles of rubble.

But strangely there was no bodies, no blood. Just discarded rifles, helmets, spent casings… was that a rocket launcher?

"Shouldn't there be more… mess." He asked the Black General.

"The Orichalcos takes all for the glory of the Great Beast, as if they were never here, and never stained this land with their presence. This is the fate of those who oppose us."

As she spoke one of her subordinates suddenly collapsed.

"Weakling." She sneered.

Although the Orichalcos Gigas were technically unkillable and invincible by conventional means, their existence still depended on the duel energy their duellist summoner could provide to maintain them. Once a duellist ran out of power then they would collapse from exhaustion and the monster would disappear.

This was why strong duellist were needed in New Order. The stronger the duellist the more duel energy they possessed. The more duel energy they could supply the stronger the monster they could summon and the longer they could be maintained.

They had soon reached the deepest part of operation centre when suddenly more than half the New Order agents collapsed without warning.

"Oh?" Wyvern hurried her pace.

Turning the last corner they came to a corridor to see a half dozen Gigas being blocked by a swarm of neon light butterflies. Behind them stood a single woman blocking the last lockdown door. An active duel disk shaped like butterfly wings on her arm. Dextra.

With a smirk she spoke to the newly arrived members of New Order.

"It seems a Duel Monster is still capable of dealing with a Duel Monster after all."

This was what she had discovered. It had been a guess on her part but it had worked. Even though these strange Duel Monsters had the power to affect the real world they were not invincible, they were still tied to the artificial digital duel reality and could be affected by purely digital monsters in a duel.

She hadn't actually been able to destroy the monsters as they still continued to revive themselves with their special ability, becoming stronger and stronger each time. However this had drastically increased the drain of duel energy required to maintain them, until finally their summoners had been unable to keep up and collapsed.

So it fell to her as the strongest duellist here and as Captain of the Black Elite to hold the line as her few remaining troops evacuated the support staff through the emergency escape tunnel in the command room behind her. To think that she had been force to abandon the base to some cult like organisation.

"YOU!!" Shark shouted.

It was her, the one he came here for.

Wyvern had her men pull back and recall the Gigas beasts. Her orders from the King had been clear. This women would be handled by Shark alone, she was not to interfere.

"I will be the one dealing with you!" Shark declared as he tore of his mask and readied his duel disk.

"Shark…" Dextra said. To think that he was here, that he had been drawn into this cult. This wasn't part of Dr Fakers plan.

"I'm going to make you pay! Now duel me!" he roared.

Seeing the others pull back Dextra knew she had no choice, she still needed to buy time and hope reinforcements turned up.

"…Fine, lets duel."

---

"Orbital what the latest update?" Kite asked as he sat within the passenger compartment of a Hartland official helicopter flying through the city skies.

"COMMUNICATIONS WITH FACILITY BE1 HAVE BEEN CUT OFF. VISUAL SIGNALS BLOCKED. INTERFERENCE FIELD IN OPERATION. SENSORS DETECT EXOTIC TRACE PARTICLE OZ." Orbitals mechanical voice replied.

Particle OZ, the name his father had given to the elements emitted by the Seal of Orichalcos. New Order.

"What's our ETA?"

"30 MINS MASTER KITE."

"Hold on Dextra…" he pleaded.

---

[Turn 1 – Dextra LP:4000 Hand:5, Shark LP:4000 Hand 5]

"I will start things off, I draw!"

Dextra knew she had to stall for time, control the flow of the duel so that her people could get out and reinforcements could get here. That suited her and her deck just fine.

"I play <Reinforcement of the Army>, with this spell I can add a level 4 or lower Warrior from my deck to my hand. I choose my <Morpho Butterspy>. So tell me Shark, just when did you join this New Order cult?"

Wyvern and Shark were shocked. How could this women know about New Order already?

"How do you know about New Order?!" Wyvern demanded.

"Did you really think your secret society was really that secret? I set one monster face down and two more cards face down. Your move." she taunted.

[Turn 2 - Shark LP:4000 Hand:5, Dextra LP:4000 Hand:3]

"I don't care about any of that. I want to know what you did to my sister and why. And if I have to rip out your soul and inflict a unspeakable nightmare on you to get my answers then that's fine with me. I draw!"

"If you think I'm going to spill my secrets you're the one dreaming here."

"Heh, this card will show you just how wrong you are. I play <The Seal of Orichalcos>!"

Dextra flinched as a brilliant green light flashed before her, expanding to cover the duel field with its glow. She had read what little data there was on the Seal but this? It sent shivers down her spine as she watched its mark appear on Sharks forehead.

"Then I play my <Hammer Shark> and thanks to the Seal of Orichalcos all my monsters gain 500 ATK."

[Hammer Shark – Lv4 ATK:1700 > 2200/DEF:1500]

"Next I activate my monsters special ability. By lowering its level by 1 I can special summon a level 3 Water attribute monster from my hand, so come on out <Big Jaws>"

[Hammer Shark – Lv 4 > 3]

[Big Jaws – Lv3 ATK:1800>2300/DEF:1500]

A massive new shark with a steel reinforce jaw and massive tusk like teeth appeared on the field to join Sharks first iron headed beast.

"With these two monsters I now build the Overly Network! To Xyz Summon the terror of the seas, rank 3 <Number 47: Nightmare Shark>!"

[Number 47: Nightmare Shark – Rank 3 ATK:2000 > 2500/DEF:2000 OU:2]

"With this cards is special summoned I can attach a level three monster in my hand to it as an overlay unit, so I attach my <Left-Hand Shark>"

[Number 47: Nightmare Shark – OU:2 > 3]

Sharks beast took to the field, like a fearsome cross between a great blue shark and a wyvern. Its lower body was a long tail ending in a blade like fin, while its front two arms replaced its hands with long silvery blades. Its large fleshy wings beat softly to hold it aloft.

"Now I activate my Numbers ability! By sending a Overlay unit to the grave it allows a water type monster on my field to attack you directly this turn. Naturally as my only monster my Nightmare Shark will target itself as I send my attached Left-Hand Shark to the grave. Direct Effect!"

One of Nightmare Sharks overlay units plunged into the ground before erupting into a geyser, Sharks Number then wrapped itself in a veil of its water, its image shimmering in and out like a mirage.

"Now attack her life points directly! Deep Current!"

It charged forwards with its blades held high before vanishing into a watery current and appearing behind Dextra in a flash.

"Not so fast! I activate my face down trap <Windstorm of Etaqua> which changes the battle position of all your face up monsters. Which means your Number is forced into defence mode and my life points are safe." Dextra said without even turning her gaze away from Shark.

Green gales swept across the field and wrapped around Sharks monster like chains, flinging it back to its own side of the field before forcing it into a crouch. Shark would need to work harder than that to touch her life points.

"Humph, lets see how long you remain calm. I activate the continuous spell <Sea Lord's Amulet> this amulet shields my monsters, preventing all my water type monsters from being destroyed by card effects. I end my turn."