Chapter Text
Wednesday. The official After Hours Homework Help and unofficial BakuClub clubroom.
Ryo sat at attention, tapping away at the keyboard of his clamshell minicomputer, while Shuji leaned back in his chair, casually tossing and catching his Darkus Fear Ripper, Shreds, in the air. Nene—a rare but increasingly frequent sight at club sessions—sat between her brothers with her arms crossed, her Ventus Ravenoid, Kurai, perched on her shoulder.
Akira didn’t seem all too interested in the current conversation, chasing his Subterran Manion around the table with a pencil—the same Manion he’d less than creatively named “Lion” during one of Ryo’s attempted partner bonding activities (not that Lion seemed to care). Akira’s creativity apparently peaked with his Centipoid—currently skittering around and popping in and out of his backpack—who he’d dubbed “SnapTrap” (immediately followed by him naming his Terror Claw “ButterClaw”, and Ryo losing any hope he had in Akira taking the exercise seriously).
Tatsuya and his older sister were running late, if they were coming at all, and there’d been no word from Rikimaru one way or another on if he’d be stopping by, not that that was any surprise. If attendance had been a requirement for club membership, he would have been kicked out a long time ago.
Wren sat across the table from all of them, head propped up on one hand. Her own teammates were set out in front of her: Flame Strike—a Pyrus Serpenoid and gift from watching her first ever Brawl—currently taking an uncharacteristic break from napping in her bag or rolling around in aimless circles to “spectate” in marble form; Dust Moth—a Subterran Monarus that the cat had literally dragged in—popped out on Wren’s shoulder and locked in what looked to be a staring contest, but was more likely an unheard conversation with Kurai; and, of course, Leonidas—perched on the table next to her hand.
“So, that’s everything. I guess…” Wren rounded off her recap of the night’s, dream’s, whatever’s events. She hadn’t gotten any real sleep after everything. At least that meant no nightmares, if that counted for anything.
“The Doom Dimension?” Ryo leaned forwards, eyes wide. “I thought nobody ever came back from that- or- uh- so I’ve heard.” He somehow seemed more unnerved by this course of conversation than when he was face to face with the other club members’ Bakugan during spar sessions, but increasingly few people around school hadn’t had bad experiences having to do with Doom Cards and their users, so one really questioned it.
Shuji smirked. “Yeah right, like that’d ever happen.” He caught his Fear Ripper and rolled it between his fingers in a way that he almost certainly hoped looked cool. “Have you ever even run face with a Doom Card user?”
“Shuji!” Nene kicked her bull-headed brother hard in the shin—or, well, at least as hard as she could manage with her feet hanging up off the ground.
Shuji immediately straightened up in his seat, looking almost polite. “I mean- uh- you know, more than like- uh- that one time.”
Nene’s scowl grew.
Shuji fidgeted nervously. “And- uh- the other time…”
“No, obviously…” Wren was really too tired to start a fight.
Ryo glanced nervously between the three, really hoping he wouldn’t need to break up another argument. He’d better change the subject. “Um! Anyway- Do you remember anything about the guy you were supposed to have fought?”
Wren frowned. All the cool stuff and that’s what he zeroed in on? “Not really, the memory was fuzzy even then.”
Ryo made a face. “And you didn’t question it?”
Wren shrugged. “I don’t know, I thought maybe I had a concussion or something.” Her eyes pressed closed as she felt a wave of her partner’s shock and frustration bleed into the back of her mind. “Leo, space.”
The feeling immediately turned apologetic, then withdrew. Leonidas lowered his head. “Sorry…”
Wren grumbled. At least the emotional spillage wasn’t anywhere as bad as when they’d first met. Now it only really ever happened when he was in ball form or during high stress brawls.
Ryo adjusted his glasses as he leveled his gaze on the Darkus dragon. “Well, Leonidas, do you remember anything about the fight leading up to it?”
Leonidas grumbled something before finally answering. “Not much… Only, that- I thought I’d grabbed her before I got pulled through and that was why we were both there.”
Ryo’s eyes lit with surprise. “Grabbed her?”
“Pfft. Yeah right,” Shuji jeered. “You’re scared to even have her on your shoulder in a fight.”
Leonidas snarled and snapped to face him in a move that probably would have been intimidating if he wasn’t currently toy sized.
Ryo flinched. “Um- Wren? The rules?”
Wren sleepily tugged Leonidas back by the wing. “No growling…” she recited, sounding more disappointed by the existence of the rule than her partner’s behavior.
Leonidas popped closed with a huff.
“Ha!” Shuji’s face broke into a taunting grin. “B-A-B-I-E. Baby!”
Shreds popped out in Shuji’s hand. “It’s ‘Y’, not ‘I-E’.”
“Says you!” Shuji doubled down in a poor attempt to try and hide the embarrassment creeping across his face.
The Fear Ripper shrugged and hovered up to sit on his Brawler’s shoulder.
Kurai turned towards Nene and seemed to say something. Nene covered her mouth to stifle a laugh.
Shuji snapped towards his sister. “Hey! No fair! No secret side conversations!”
“Hm! Well, since you asked,” Nene smirked, steepling her fingers. “Kurai says that Shreds pays more attention in school than you.”
Shuji slumped back in his chair, visibly fuming.
“Ugh, what’s the point anyway?” Akira finally set down his pencil. Lion popped out, looking around before rolling into Akira’s open palm. “If it’s a dream, then it’s a dream. Whatever. Can’t we brawl already?”
Ryo eyes gleamed with a thinly veiled excitement. “The point is- none of us knew about these Legendary Soldiers until today, aside from our Bakugan.”
Akira shrugged. “So?”
Nene tapped her arm, clearly running low on patience for her brothers, and frankly for the rest of the group. “So, that means that either Wren just happened to make the whole thing up in her head by some huge coincidence—”
“Or that it was some kind of message!” Ryo interrupted.
“Hey!” Nene snapped.
Ryo scratched the back of his head apologetically. “Sorry—”
Shuji made a face. “A message? Like what? Keep out?”
“We’re doing a pretty good job of that already.” Wren murmured.
Dust Moth fluttered from Wren’s shoulder into her Brawler’s field of view. Wren held out a hand for the Monarus to perch, setting her down on the table next to Flame Strike. The Serpenoid hadn’t moved all meeting. Wren was starting to think it’d fallen asleep. Lucky.
Leonidas was being eerily quiet.
Ryo glanced back towards the Darkus dragon. “Leonidas?”
Leonidas wiggled in place. “There was, something else.”
“A message?”
He shook his head. “A warning.”
“About what? Vladitor? Masquer-” Ryo cut himself off as Wren shot him a dirty look. “All this- Doom- Card- stuff?”
“No,” Leonidas’s voice grew stern. “Something bigger.”
An air of unease filled the room.
“Well?” Ryo pressed for more.
“Well?” Leonidas looked back at him, not seeming to understand the question.
Ryo gestured vaguely. “Anything specific?”
“Not really…” Leonidas grumbled. “It was more of a feeling.”
Shuji rolled his eyes. “Great, all of this over a feeling.”
“Whatever, can we brawl now?” Akira moaned, back to mirroring his older brother’s attitude.
Wren finally gave in to her exhaustion and flopped her head in her arms. Dust Moth flittered out of the way and landed back on her shoulder while Flame Strike rolled over into her palm. So it was awake, or it was just looking for a warm spot to curl up. Leonidas popped open to stare at his Brawler with what looked like concern.
Ryo popped open his computer, checking over his—now in desperate need of alterations—plans for the day. “Alright, today’s match ups. Right, Wren, sorry, you’re benched. Take a nap maybe?”
Wren gave a thumbs up from the table.
He crossed out her name, knocking out all of her team members except one. “Leonidas are you alright working with Shuji today?”
Shuji sat bolt upright in his seat. “Hey! Why don’t you volunteer to work with the big scary dragon for once?”
Ryo looked on the verge of sweating bullets. “I mean, I could, but I- uh- you know. I’m not a Brawler, and you’ve been running a Darkus deck, so—”
“You’re both scaredy-cats.” Nene sniffed.
Leonidas slouched, but didn’t turn away from watching Wren. “I’m- fine…”
Ryo gave him a questioning look. That was weird. Maybe the whole dream thing really did have some physical truth to it. Usually Leonidas was just as bad as Akira when it came to begging to fight. Ryo let out a sigh of relief, crossing out his entry for the day as well. “Never mind I guess. Shuji, Akira, Nene: three person Battle Royale. Today’s emphasis is card synergies. Base ruleset, no deck limits.”
Shuji groaned and Akira rolled his eyes. Nene, on the other hand, looked all too ready to beat her brothers to a pulp.
“It’s that or drills,” That earned an even bigger groan from all three. Ryo sighed, whipping out his Field Card. Everyone else followed suit, including Wren. Nothing like a time dilated pocket dimension to catch up on lost sleep—or irrevocably mess up your sleep schedule. “Ready?”
They all answered with a mix of affirmatives, nods, and thumbs-ups.
“Let’s go!” All five flipped their cards in relative unison. “Field Open!”
The walk home was quiet. Wren took the less trafficked, but still somewhat frequented streets, empty enough to hold a conversation, but not enough to be out of sight of another pedestrian for long. Most of the other students had taken to walking home in groups or pairs since Doom Cards had started circulating through the local playerbase. That and the occasional sighting of one—make that two now—Masked Brawlers was enough to scare most of her fellow peers into banking on safety in numbers, but, well, with Wren hanging out after school for club activities, there weren’t many other kids going her way to walk with. So Wren walked alone, her Bakugan gear stashed out of sight.
Well, not totally alone.
Leonidas rode along on her shoulder, tucked into the collar of her oversized baseball jacket—secondhand from her Dad. He was quiet today. That wasn’t really all that strange. What had been a surprise was his refusing to pop into full form at all while the others spared. Usually he’d be insistent on her tossing him out, even if it was just for him to cool off on a Gate Card alone for a bit. Wren tilted her head back to watch the streetlights pass overhead. He really couldn’t be more different from her old partner. Well, that wasn’t entirely true. He couldn’t be more different other than in the way that really mattered. The same way that’d already landed one and now almost both of them in the Doom Dimension, out of reach forever. She sighed.
She could feel Leonidas’s feelings of irritation (or maybe concern?) leaking into the back of her thoughts. She should probably say something. “Leo?”
Leonidas grumbled in acknowledgement. “There’s something on your mind.”
“Mm,” Wren hummed. Not a day went by that she wasn’t thankful that this whole projecting thoughts into her brain thing wasn’t a two-way street. At least that gave her some space. “I- it didn’t even cross my mind to look for them.”
Leonidas looked from Wren to the path ahead. He hadn’t thought to look for her former partner either. He’d been avoiding any and all Bakugan. What if they were one of the ones still alive out there? Leonidas shoved the creeping doubt away. “You were in danger.”
“But we were there!” Wren gave a defeated sigh. “We were right there.”
Had he been too occupied with trying to get out of there? There was no way he could have forgotten. It had to be something else. “They were messing with our heads.”
Wren fidgeted at the straps of her backpack. “So they made me forget, everything? After everything?”
“Maybe…”
“So, when they sent me back, they could have just—”
Leonidas cut her off, not liking where this train of thought was headed. “Wren, you’re overthinking this.”
Wren walked on in silence for a minute. “Do you think you could get out of there on your own?”
Leonidas went quiet before finally shaking his head. “Probably not.” The admission hung in the air for a moment. When he spoke up again, his voice was stern. “Wren, odds are we can’t avoid playing against Doom Card users forever. If worse comes to worst— If I ever get—”
“Nope!” Wren interrupted, immediately seeing where this was going and not liking it.
“I— What?”
“You promised you wouldn’t quit until I told you, and you did anyway. So nope!”
Leonidas glared. “You’re joking.”
Wren steepled her fingers, having maybe a bit too much fun with this. “I’d follow you in.”
“You’d die.”
“Good!”
“Don’t say that!”
“Then don’t leave me behind!”
“Leave you behi— I sent you home!”
Wren waved her hand in a dismissive gesture. “And unless the Warriors wiped my brain, I’d go back to get you.” Feelings of frustration and a barely contained rage edged into the back of her brain. Wren rolled her eyes, looking down at her seething partner. “Hey, space.”
The creeping emotions eased off, but without any real apology this time around. “Hmph,” Leonidas popped closed and flung himself into the topmost pocket of her backpack. “You’re an idiot.”
“Takes one to know one, jerk.” Wren stuck out her tongue, even if he couldn’t see it. “You’re not getting rid of me that easily.”
Leonidas shot back with what might have been a hum, or might have been a growl.
It was a long and quiet walk home.