Chapter 16: Black and Blue.

Drake was tired and, in all honesty, a little scared.

It had taken everything he had to forcible break the Seal of Orichalcos and that was from the outside, where the Seal was weakest. Before this he had always felt that when push came to shove, even if he lost a duel against a Seal user, so long as it was only the first layer of the Seal he would be able to escape with the power of the Sword of Wisdom.

Now he knew better.

Maybe it would work if Critias could take his true form and wield the blade himself, but Drake himself didn't have the skill or strength to achieve such a feat. If he lost then his fate would be the same as everyone else.

{Maybe not} Critias interrupted Drakes thoughts.

{What do you mean?} Drake asked.

{So long as you have enough stored duel energy then in theory you could wield the blade with strength equal to my own}

That's right, duel energy, the same energy that operated the Mirror of Critias could also be used to empower Critias's sword. That was the power he had infused into the blade with his Dragons Eye and Critias help. But…

He had exhausted that power just now, two days worth of duelling including the additional energy he obtained from four Number duels was gone, just like that. And it was barely enough. Just how many days worth of duelling would be required to get Drake the power needed to break the seal from the inside. And even then, that would mean giving up on creating new cards to strengthen his deck.

Argh!

He would leave it for later, after all at the moment he had no energy to use anyway.

Drake looked down at Hopkirk.

He had fainted from the experience of almost losing his soul.

Now more than ever Drake wished he had not been such an idiot. Every time he thought about it, he just wanted to slap his own head. Previously he had had a perfect chance to acquire information about this New Order. Not from some nobody who probably didn't know much anyway but from a true member.

Chapman. The first duellist he fought who used the Seal. He would have had to a have been a true member of the organisation, who knows how much Drake could have learned if he had just interrogated him properly? Their location, members, their leader.

But no, when he had seen all the duellist souls that guy had captured, he had been infuriated. He had forgotten what was important and just wanted to punish him. Allowing the Seal to steal his soul away from his grasp and fly away in a moment of icy rage before he could calm down and think.

Then it had been too late.

And now? Even though he had destroyed the camera drones during the duel, when New Order received no soul they would at least be able to guess Drake had the power to break the Seal.

They would be unlikely to underestimate him again.

Things had gotten a lot harder and more dangerous for him and those around him.

Should he leave Yuma's house? Was his presence only going to put them in more danger?

So absorbed in his own thoughts Drake didn't notice that he and Hopkirk weren't the only ones present any more. For some time now, even before the duel had ended, they were being watched.

---

"Orbital, transmit the data you collected to my father."

"YES MASTER KITE…" came a mechanical reply from man's duel disk.

One watcher was the Number Hunter, Kite. After the Network Blockers had failed the duel between the two of them had once more alerted the Heartland control centre setting off all kinds of alarms. Alarms that Kite had been monitoring and with the help of his personal AI controlled satellite Orbital 7 tracked down before anyone else could. He was currently at the edge of the park viewing everything Orbital 7's high optic cameras and sensors picked up through his duel gazer.

Orbital 7 was a bleeding edge high altitude satellite in geosynchronous orbit above Heartland city, its personal AI connected to Kites duel disk as well as the city's main computer networks allowing it to monitor Duel alerts and emergency channels for Numbers activity. It was also responsible for monitoring Harts medical condition and operating Kites remote support equipment. But its most important feature was its ability to project the Time Freeze field effect to any point in Hartland City when Kite needed it.

This was the first time Kite had witnessed the power of the Seal of Orichalcos, but he could guess that it was involved with his father's latest research project. Having seen the power for himself Kite was wary and did not wish to make a move yet.

He would watch and see what else he could learn for now. But even he and monitoring equipment onboard Orbital 7 failed to realise they were not the only ones watching Drake just now.

From the shadows a tall and mysterious female also watched, her scarlet hair swaying in the wind. Dress seductively all in black, her face was covered in a dragonic half mask, leaving her lower face and her ruby lipstick mouth revealed. Seeing her one would instantly think, Femme fatale. Her body was frozen in shock at what she had just witnessed.

Such power! That dragon and that sword! She thought.

It was truly worth sneaking her way here without orders.

Her personal com system buzzed in her ear with an incoming message.

"General Black, your mission has been cancelled. You are to return to HQ immediately on his Highnesses order. Over"

"Roger that." She replied after taking one more look at man before her who had done what she thought was impossible. A smile on her lips. Finally, she thought, she had found some worthy prey. And like a phantom she vanished into the shadow behind her, disappearing from the world.

---

Once Hopkirk woke up he told Drake, and although they didn't know it Kite, everything he knew.

Just like Drake feared, it wasn't much at all. Apart from some basic information about the Seal that Drake already knew far better than Hopkirk himself, he knew almost nothing concrete. New Order had contacted him through untraceable burner accounts, their two meetings had been in different locations which had then been cleared out.

Hopkirk might be a cheat and scum, but he was not completely stupid. He had tried to gather his own info on New Order with his own methods before agreeing to their deal.

From what he had pieced together about New Order, it seemed like they were led by a figure known as the Orichalcos King. Below him were his top executives, the Generals of Order. Hopkirk himself had heard the minion who gave him the Drones refer to one known as the Silver General as the one who had organised the whole thing and that a fifth General had be newly promoted, meaning there were at least five of these Generals.

They had at least one member in a high position of power in the city's Security forces to be able to get Drakes file and had to have lots of money and some connection to high tech industries. Hopkirk had studied the drones and discovered they were custom build with tech even the government might not have access to.

And that was basically all.

It was nowhere near enough, but nothing could change that.

So Drake left Hopkirk with the advice of getting as far away, as fast as possible. Before New Order decided to clean up loose ends.

But before he left Drake made sure to burn Hopkirks entire deck to ashes. He couldn't just let a cheat like him go with all those powerful cards New Order had handed to him, and it gave Drake some small pleasure to listen to Hopkirks wails.

Then Drake made his own way home.

Strange to think that after just a few days that he already considered this place, this world, like home.

When he got in, he found Grandma Tsukumo having tea with her old friend Meredith, although it seemed like they each kept forgetting exactly what they were talking about, they were having fun. She asked Drake to take the dinner she had prepared into her granddaughter who was busy working away in the computer room.

"Oh Drake, your back early."

"Yeah… just stopped in for some lunch." Drake replied.

"Is there a problem?" Akari asked. It didn't take her keen investigators intuition to notice how hesitant Drake was.

"No, yes. We… we need to talk. Your grandmother too, it can wait till she's free."

"…Alright. Is it about Yuma?" She asked in worry.

"No, its about me."

---

"Ah Wyvern, there you are." Called out a man clad in lightweight polished silver armour to the black masked woman who had been watching Drakes duel earlier.

"I prefer you call me by my title General Silver." The woman called Wyvern coldly replied as she walked past the Silver General of New Order.

"Fine, fine, my dear General Black. Anything interesting happen while you were out on your mission?" the Silver General asked as he turned to follow her.

"Not particularly. Why? Did I miss something?" she said, giving nothing else away.

"Apparently his Highness called in Gold, White and the new boy Blue to watch a fun show but things didn't go as planned." As the two of them continued to walk down the corridor.

"Oh?" She feigned surprise.

"Yes, his Highness was not pleased."

"Is that why we were called in?" Wyvern asked.

"No, I've already been given my task but this latest blunder shouldn't effect it. As for you, who knows? Have you been a bad bad girl?"

*Umph!*

He gasped out as Wyverns elbow got him in the gut. She tired easily of the fool's advances and the clowns remarked had hit a bit too close to home. But she was sure no one knew about her unauthorised actions and it was going to stay that way.

If they knew what she had seen in that park Wyvern was sure her king would mobilise all the Generals after that man. She didn't want to share her prey with the others.

Finally she reached the audience chamber of the King, Silver had long since stop following. He had already been given his instructions and had no reason to return so soon. Entering the hall Wyvern couldn't help but admire the splendour of the room, of the large stone tiles that covered its walls and floors illuminated only by the light of the torch scones.

It was primitive compared to using proper lighting, but it also gave a mysterious and regal air. As she walked to the throne she couldn't help but look down at the slabs of stones she walked on, some were plain and empty while many had engraved the figures of the poor souls imprisoned with.

Such a display of power made her feel giddy.

"General Black." Said the figure on the throne, to his left stood a blue robed figure she had never seen before.

Although Wyvern had not met him before, this she assumed was the new General Blue. After studying him she could only wonder, just what did her King see in this person?

"My King." She said as she bowed to the one person she held above all others.

"I have a task for you."

---

Drake, Akari and her grandmother Haru were seated around the dining table. He had just finished telling them about New Order and the danger it posed to them and their family.

"I understand if you want me to leave, I can pack my things tonight." Drake offered.

"This.. this is crazy."

"Calm down Akari."

"No Grandma I won't. Secret societies, Duel Monster cards that can steal souls. Its madness and I don't want Yuma mixed up in this, I don't want us mixed up with this. If he wants to leave then he can just leave, now!"

Drake had been expecting such a response but it didn't make his heart feel any less heavy.

"That enough! The boy can stay here as long as he likes." Haru Tsukumo declared.

"Grandmother…"

"He has been honest and forthright about his intentions and the danger involve. I don't approve of just kicking him away because he is in danger for doing the right thing, and if your father were here then he would agree with me."

"But!-"

"No. I know you are afraid, but your father did not raise you to just bury your head in the sand when times got tough. Nor is your brother as helpless as you like to think he is. You can't shield him from the world forever, nor should you use him as an excuse to cut yourself off from the world either."

"That's not true! I-"

"When was the last time you spoke to anyone outside of family or work?

"I..." She had no retort, honestly her talks with Drake were the closest she had come to socialising in many months. She was just so busy with work, or so she told herself.

"Drake, if you leave how certain are you that nothing will happen to us here?" The old lady asked him seriously. It was so unlike the slightly goofy grandma he had seen just a short while earlier.

"Not very, even if I never came here it would only have been a matter of time before they set their sights on Yuma." He replied truthfully. Astral and the Numbers would always have become targets and Yuma would never give up on his friend.

"Why?!" asked Akari.

"Because he is collecting the Number Cards, and New Order wants them too." revealing the Numbers was one thing, but he wouldn't discuss Astral without his permission.

"Numbers! Cards with what? Magic power. How can you expect us to believe something like that, that Yuma is involved with something like that!" Akari protested.

"If you don't believe that then why believe any of it? If you think I'm lying then you must also believe you are in no danger. You can't have it both ways."

"I believe you." Grandma Tsukumo cut in before addressing her granddaughter.

"Your father travelled all over the world and saw some amazing things. Things that science and reason would say was impossible. And he's not the only one. Our family has always had its share of explorers and dreamers, those who dared to seek the unknown or unexplained. It's in the blood along with our principles. Courage, determination, friendship and loyalty." She finished

She turned back to Drake.

"Stay, I these old bones will feel safer if you're here and I'm sure Yuma would want you to stay too."

Her words left no room for argument as she got up to make herself some more tea. But Drake was more interested in Akari's decision.

"Fine, stay. Just remember the promise you made me."

She sounded so tired as she returned to her work room.

---

It was now late at night, Wyvern waited as she observed the warehouse before her. While she would follow her kings orders without objection, she could not help but question these latest orders that she had been given.

She was waiting as New Order operatives quietly surrounded the building. To all outward appearances it seemed just another average warehouse among many other warehouses. At this time of night there was no activity in the entire district but New Order knew that this particular warehouse held a secret.

It was a base of operations for Dr Fakers personal elite security squadron, the Black Elite.

What was her king thinking by ordering a strike against Faker after all their work in concealing their presence? With their recent increase in operations for the Duel Carnival it was true that they would be exposed sooner or later but why act now?

Just for him?

It infuriated Wyvern that her king should take such measures and endanger the secrecy of the Order just for his sake. His new toy, General Blue. What made him so special? She wondered.

Speaking of which, the object of her ire had approached her from behind.

"You're sure she's in there?" he questioned.

"Do you doubt our intelligence Blue." She snapped back.

"I joined you people for only one thing, if you can't deliver then…" he threatened.

"You'll what? I don't know what our king sees in you, nor why you are getting such special treatment, endangering years of careful work, but you mean nothing to me boy. If you dare threaten the Order you will suffer worse than you can imaging. So listen well Shark! You'll get your chance at Dextra tonight, but I am in charge of this operations so stand back and be silent."