It was not often that Doctor Mutou got time to herself. The Doctor of Archaeology was also the Head of the Magic within Ancient Cultures course at the University she had once studied at and unlike some of her colleagues she actually liked interacting with her students and often could be found giving students extra support or tutoring on magic.
Between the extra support she gave her students and her duties to the Clan and the Duellist Kingdom as the Heir to her father’s throne she did not tend to have a moment to spare for herself. Sleep was a luxury, yet alone actually getting a chance to go for a drive with no one hovering over her shoulder.
When the lecture hall she was supposed to be teaching in had been flooded out by a combination of bad weather and some idiot breaking a water pipe, she took advantage of the situation. Within five minutes of slapping a notice on the outer door to the building stating that the lecture was cancelled, she had put on her helmet, backed her bike out of the drive and shot off.
She sped down the main road, her motorbike’s engine roaring as she and her vehicle headed for the motorway, enjoying the feel of freedom. Peace and quiet was a rare commodity, it always had been amongst her family. So she valued every moment like this she could get.
She paused at the red lights, shifting her HoloDuel off of her arm and into its safe holster that her cousin, Ayumi Kaiba, who had developed the Solid Vision Hologram Duel Disk, had designed specifically for her motorcycle to allow Tenshi to take it with her without having to wear the damn thing over her bike leathers. Another motorcycle pulled up to the line alongside her. Tenshi glanced at the rider of the red and black motorcycle and found that brown eyes were watching her carefully. That was not what held her attention though. What did that was the little green glowing gem that hung on a pendant around his neck.
Tenshi grimaced as turned her attention back to the road. One of her students had brought her a gem just like that one and when she had turned it over to her family, they had warned her off of it and asked her to keep an eye out for anyone who was carrying it. She was sure they had doubled her guard too, but they were getting better at being sneaky about it and she had yet to catch them at it.
As the lights changed to green, Tenshi attempted to speed off and lose the guy beside her, only to hear his motor just behind her the entire time. Reaching the speed limit easily the moment she hit the motorway, she let out a hiss as the guy kept up with her, dogging her trail.
“This is ridiculous...” She growled, going to activate the inbuilt microphone in her helmet when the sight of her HoloDuel activating of its own accord shocked her into complete silence. Wondering what the hell was happening, she watched as the HoloDuel’s Virtual Deck system booted up, shuffling the virtual cards and emitting her first five ‘drawn’ cards just above her handlebars. “Shit. Shit. Shit.”
Glancing over at the guy on the other bike she saw a strange looking HoloDuel attached to his bike in a much rougher manner than hers, it’s arm piece circular with a strange bright green star surrounded by two circle with runes in between in the same sickly colour. It too was active and he had flipped up his visor to smirk at her.
“How the hell?” Tenshi hissed, realising that her HoloDuel had been hacked and its Virtual Deck system, which was only in the very first HoloDuels and was supposed to only be a backup in case the solid vision holograms couldn’t support the real cards, had been forced into activation. “No bloody way.” She growled, risking taking one hand off of the handlebars in order to hit the power switch on her disk.
When it did not respond to her fiddling she let out a furious noise, noting that the other biker had already started his move, placing one card in defence mode and one card face down and activated the mic in her helmet before putting her hand back on the handlebars, determined not to crash while dealing with the minor issue of some idiot who thought that trying to play card games while travelling seventy miles an hour was a good idea.
“Tenshi to Home?” She spoke aloud, watching him gesture that it was her move.
“Home here. Pulling up your location now.” Aunt Hermione’s voice came through the speaker by her ear as she tried again to shut off her disk, “What the...?”
“Not my fault.” Tenshi shot back, torn between her natural competiveness and desire to win and the awareness that this was a ridiculous situation and she should have as little part in it as possible. “He hacked my HoloDisk. Virtual Deck started by itself.”
“Turn it back off then.” Tenshi’s aunt sounded less than amused.
“Tried that already.” Tenshi replied, before scowling and flipping up her visor, “Draw.” She ordered her HoloDuel, which made the system pull up another card. She could not quite hear what her aunt was saying over the noise as she slowed down, irritating her opponent and everyone behind her until she pulled into the ‘slow’ lane furthest over on the left hand side, but it sounded like ‘Mutou Tenshi, don’t even think about it.’
“Card one, card three face down, card six, face down, defence mode.” Tenshi ordered, looking for the nearest exit ramp so she could pull over and finish this Duel before smacking the moron in the face only to grimace when the next city was not for thirty-eight miles and the next services weren’t for another twenty-one. Once her HoloDuel was done following her orders, she glowered over to her opponent, “Oi, moron!” She bellowed, uncertain if he could hear her or not, “Your turn.”
Still just about able to hear Hermione scolding through the earphone, Tenshi watched both the road and her opponent at the same time. It was not easy, the road was not clear. She was just glad that the solid vision holograms that were floating in front of her bike were not interfering with the other vehicles on the road. She could do this. She did not need to win while they were still moving and the moment they left the motorway she could pull over legally and beat him. As long as it stayed just a duel, admittedly a high speed one, she could easily handle it.
Then he played a field card and the rules changed. Tenshi let out a started yelp as green washed past her, the same symbol on the man’s HoloDuel appearing below them and glowing with the same sickly green colour.
Tenshi paled. She had been warned about this. The Seal of Orichelcos was now in play.
“Hey Aunt ‘Mione?” Tenshi informed the woman listening to what was going on, “I might be in trouble.”
Both thankful and horrified that the Seal was keeping up with the two motorcyclists, Tenshi pushed her bike to keep up with her opponent, now playing catch up with him. The Seal was emitted by his HoloDuel and if she did not manage to keep up, the barrier, which she had been informed let inanimate objects in but did not allow living material to pass through, would have her off of her bike and at this speed a crash would probably kill her.
Amethyst eyes went wide as she realised something else. There were other motorists on the road and they were in danger too. The Seal would keep anyone but the two Duellists out but just as it would most likely allow her bike out, it would allow the cars in but not the people in them.
“Pull over!” Tenshi demanded, her voice barely carrying over the wind passing them.
“Not allowed.” The man, who had a broad Australian accent shook his head. “We’re on the motorway, remember?” He played another card in defence mode. “It’s your move.”
“Great, how come I get the speed freak?” Tenshi groaned to herself. “Draw.” The order was full of frustration but the HoloDuel responded. In her earpiece she could hear that Hermione had stopped scolding and instead was passing on information to other Clan members, while in the background someone was getting the motorway blocked off to other users. The fact that she was not going to be alone in this was reassuring for the Heir to the Throne, who had never been alone while going into battle in her entire life.
Tenshi let out a relieved sigh at the card she had drawn even as she sped up, forcing her opponent who wanted her soul, not her life, to speed up to and allowing them to pull away from the cars that had been slowly creeping closer and closer. She sacrificed her face down plant monster for her Queen Angel of Roses, who looked rather startled to be moving at high speed.
“Queen Angel!” Tenshi bellowed, catching her Duel Monster’s attention, “Attack the monster on his left!” Her opponent tried to activate Magic Cylinder to counter the attack, but Tenshi was ready, activating her Dust Tornado to destroy it and allow her seven star monster’s attack to go through.
The other biker let out a curse as his monster blew up in his face. Tenshi let out a worried hiss as his bike wobbled for moment, the Seal wobbling with him, relief setting in when he settled himself and no longer looked like he was going to crash. By the time he had stopped swerving dangerously they had passed a sign for the services stating that they were just less than ten miles out.
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