Yu-Gi-Oh Dance Battles - Season 2 idea

"This does not look like it's going to be easy," Yuni remarked as their group came to a halt before a bridge. The blond girl stepped aside as those behind her moved forward to see why she had stopped.

The bridge before them was composed of stone squares in a gridwork pattern. Each square had an arrow etched into it and painted a different color. Each arrow pointed either forward, backward, to the left, or to the right.

"These squares remind me of the arrows on the arcade machines," Emi remarked.

Rage tapped her on the shoulder before handing her a pair of binoculars that he had borrowed from Rebecca, the Asian man pointing toward the far end of the bridge. "You may want to check that out," he stated.

Emi put the field glasses to her eyes and gasped in surprise at what she saw - Bandit Keith's retreating form. She looked at the far end of the bridge to see if any sort of trap had been set, her eyes widening when she saw the arrows beginning to glow faintly. "I see it, but I don't believe it," she remarked as she handed the binoculars to Akira.

"What did ya see?" Joey asked.

"Trouble," Emi replied. "Our favorite person in the entire world, Keith."

Joey and Tristan each made a face. "What the hell is he doing here?!" Tristan demanded as he started toward the bridge.

He stopped short as he felt someone tug on the collar of his overcoat, and a moment later he was sitting on the ground and looking up at Rebecca, whose expression told him that he should probably listen before taking off. "Let me guess, trouble?"

"These ruins appear to have been crafted by some ancient race that harnessed the power of dancing," Rebecca said as Joey and Duke helped Tristan to his feet. "The only way to cross the bridge is to hit only the glowing arrows."

"Sounds easy enough," Joey beamed.

Rebecca sighed and pointed to the bridge. "You're used to dancing on a 4 or 8 square grid," she said, "the bridge is roughly 20 squares across and an unknown number of squares long. You need to make sure your steps are precise, otherwise..."

To demonstrate her point she tossed one of the lesser liked MREs onto a non-glowing square. A moment later the square, as well as the eight squares around it, vanished, taking the MRE with them. Five beats later the squares reappeared like they had never left.

"Booby trap," Mai stated, which earned her an affirmative nod. "Perfect."

"We should cross the bridge in pairs," Akira stated, "Yuni, you're with me."

"Of course," Yuni replied with a smile and a nod.

"Emi, you should go with Rage. Lex, you should go with..."

"Me, right?" Joey asked.

Lex shook his head. "Sorry blondie bear," the brunette man replied, "but Teá should be my partner, as we have a higher synch when it comes to dancing."

Teá nodded before turning to her friends. "Joey, you should go with Mai. Duke, you should help Rebecca."

"What about me?" Tristan demanded.

"You can wait here with Gus," Rage said, "that way if Keith somehow slips past us you can stop him here."

Tristan pondered this for a moment before cracking his knuckles. "Sounds fair," he said.

Gus pulled a portable speaker system from his pack and plugged his media player into it. "Any requests?" the DJ asked as the dancing adventurers stretched and prepared to flirt with danger.

"Something fitting," was the general request from the party.

[BGM: 'Stigmata' - Mana Khemia OST]

Everyone stepped back as the opening strains of what Gus hoped was a fitting song filled the air, Yuni and Akira taking up position several steps back from the bridge. The duo nodded to one another before running at the bridge, where they leaped into the air to clear the initial six rows of stones, some of the arrows beneath them flashing in time to the rhythm while other arrows remained dark and inactive. They each touched down on a left-right combo of flashing arrows before continuing across the bridge.

The pair of Akira and Yuni remained relatively quiet as they made their way across the bridge, only speaking in arrow directions - forward; down; left; right; split. They crossed paths several times when one spotted the next arrow that they would need, the other dancer using the extra moment to find a smiliar directional arrow to land on a split second later.

After what seemed like an eternity the first pair reached the other side of the bridge and waved back to the next pair to start across. "Do I say good luck or break a leg?" Mai inquired as Rage and Emi prepared for their trek across the bridge.

"I think 'break a leg' is much more fitting," Emi replied as she tucked her hat into the back of Rage's belt. "Ready when you are," she said to her partner.

Rage crouched down and laced his fingers together before nodding to his partner. Emi, in turn, ran forward, leapt into the air, and performed a forward somersault before tucking her foot into Rage's hands. The Asian man grunted as he launched his partner into the air, and once he was sure that she was in the air and safely on her way he hopped to his feet, took two large strides, and threw himself toward the center of the bridge.

"LEFT," the pair said in unison as their feet struck a glowing left arrow. Rage flipped backward while Emi performed a no-handed cartwheel, the pair hitting a forward / down combo before continuing on their way up the bridge.

At one point near the center of the bridge Emi's toe grazed one of the non-glowing squares, activating the trap. The blue-haired girl flipped backward a split second before nine squares disappeared from view, a few choice words echoing throughout the chamber as she touched down on two glowing squares. She took a deep breath before continuing across the bridge, where she collapsed into Rage's arms upon reaching the other side.

"We're going to need to do this quickly," Lex said as he and Teá stretched in preparation for their journey across the bridge.

"Bro, it looks like the arrows are starting to flash rather than glow," Joey said.

This latest news left the larger group pondering if it was worth it to continue on this journey, or have the quartet who had already crossed persue Keith without them. In the end it was decided that Rage, Akira, Emi, and Yuni would continue after Keith, and the others would catch up when possible.

"What would your friend Yugi do if he were here?" Gus asked Tristan, Joey, and Mai as Lex gazed across the bridge.

"Everything in his power to help us," Teá replied.

"He always had our backs when we needed help," Tristan added.

"Let's do this for Yug!" Joey said, pumping his fist into the air.

Lex clapped a hand on Joey's shoulder and nodded. "If he would attempt something this dangerous to help you, then we need to at least try to make it across so that we can help him."

Teá nodded and slipped her hand into Lex's. "Ready when you are, partner," she said.

Lex nodded before turning to Joey. "Be careful, blondie bear."

Joey chuckled and playfully mussed Lex's hair. "You be careful as well bud."

With one last glance at the rest of their assembled group Lex and Teá approached the bridge. "Did Yugi have any sayings that might be helpful right now?" he whispered before taking a deep breath to focus.

Teá nodded. "His favorite saying involved his Duel Monsters deck and how, if he felt lost during a duel he would focus on the heart of the cards to help him out."

Lex pondered this for a moment. Did they have something similar in the dance world? When he felt lost during a match was there something that he focused upon? "The rhythm of the song is the heart of my world," he said, his eyes drifting closed. He allowed himself to get lost in the music pumping from Gus's speaker system.

In his mind's eye a grid of arrows appeared. Above this grid formed the four arrows familiar to those who spent a lot of time on DDR machines. A stream of arrows began to flash up the grid in time to the music, the arrows shifting to the familiar colors of quarter notes, eighth notes, off-beats, and hold arrows. Taking two more deep breaths he launched himself forward and into a cartwheel. From this he rounded off into a back hand-spring that launched him eight squares out onto the bridge.

As the music continued to pump through the chamber he worked his way up the bridge, his entire body acting as a controller as he hit flashing squares with his hands and his feet. Back with the base group Joey nearly dropped the binoculars he was using to track his friend when he realized that Lex had yet to open his eyes.

"He's crazy," the blond boy muttered.

"Crazy good," Duke stated. "If I didn't know better I'd think he was taking a page from Yugi's playbook on this challenge."

Joey reached into the back pocket of his jeans and extracted two cards - Baby Dragon and Time Wizard. "The heart of the cards," he said, recalling that these were the cards that Yugi had given to him so many years ago, and that the king of games was fond of reminding his friends of the heart of the cards helping them in their times of need. "Mai," he said, his gaze on Lex and Teá as they crossed the bridge.

"Yes Joey?"

"Ready to dance?"

Mai nodded slowly. "Ready as I'll ever be," she said, slipping her hand into Joey's. She smiled as the blond boy's fingers twined with her own. "Joey?"

"Don't worry," Joey replied to Mai's silent request, "I promised long ago that I'd protect you, and I don't intend to break that promise."

The blond woman giggled and blushed lightly. Looking across the bridge, she grew serious when she saw Lex and Teá waving to them. "All right handsome, let's dance."


-To be continued...