Reawakening

Karasu's eyes fluttered open as she groaned softly in pain. The area around her looked unfamiliar, though she knew she wasn't wherever the last duel had taken place. 'That's right the shadow game..' she began to recall shaking her head lightly. She reached her hand from under the blanket of the bed she had been placed in, rubbing her head. She lost. She remembered that much, but everything after that was a blur. Her head was throbbing, and her body was sore all over. Remembering she had no idea where she was, she shot up out of the bed, only to feel an intense pain all over her body as she cringed lightly, looking around. She appeared to be in the bedroom of a small apartment building. The room was scarcely decorated, save for what appeared to be hundreds upon hundreds of cards littering the assorted tables and cabinets, scattered around were also random parts from what looked like duel disks and over various devices.

"Hey, I see you're finally up." Came the male voice from the door, as the boy opened it slowly. Tokashiro stood at the entrance to the room, leaning against the frame of the door as he raked a hand through his black, messy hair. Karasu jumped slightly, scooting back against the bed trying to distance herself from the male. Was he an enemy or ally? She could sense the boy had quite the dueling spirit, even though he was suppressing a great deal of it. "I'm Toka," the boy spoke, pointing to himself. "I found you on the beach after scouting out an area I was getting some dark energy readings from. I'm guessing by your duel disk and the condition I found you in, you were involved in some kind of shadow game right?"

The girl only nodded silently, clenching her arm tightly as she searched around finding her duel disk and cards near the bed; laid out neatly. She looked to her disk then back at him worriedly.

"Don't worry, I didn't look at your cards or anything. So can you tell me who it was you were dueling that attacked you?"

Karasu blinked then winced in pain, grasping her head. She couldn't quite remember the male's name. Maybe for a good reason. Toka simply shook his head and headed into the other room.

"Don't worry about it. I'll make us something to eat then." he called out to her.

A T.V. was on about 10 feet from the bed Karasu was on. It was a very small one, so it didn't stick out too much from the clutter. But something was about to get her intention.

"We're here live with an exclusive interview with Chuku Hanarenai, on of the 32 duelists who has made it to the Pro National League. So tell us, do you have any tips for how to succeed as a duelist?" The guy, Chuku, was the same guy who challenged Karasu to a shadow duel.

"Well first find a deck strategy, or strategies, that work for you, and stick with that. If you have a strategy that's all over the place, then you won't get far. It also helps to watch other pros duel to get a heads up as to what you're up against." He said all this in a monotone.

"How long have you been dueling?"

"10 years give or take. I started out when I was with my stepfather. I used to watch old pro duels back in the day. My favorite duelist was Haruna Shizuoka. Shame she retired though, I wanted to duel her."

"One last question. How do you plan to win?"

"you'll have to find out."

"That's all the time we have. The tournament begins in one day. We're giving you exclusive coverage to it!"

Karasu looked to the T.V. curiously, jumping back a bit at the sudden realization that it was on. She had never seen something like it before, so of course she was naturally curious. She crawled out of the bed and over to the electrical box, tapping it as she tried to wrap her mind around how the people were stuck inside this thing. She blinked, eyes widening as she noticed Chuku on the television, a few memories of their duel coming back to her. "C-Chuku..?" she blinked. She gasped out in pain as a faint image of the skull he had shown her from before haunted her mind, grasping her head in pain.

Toka returned, holding two cups of instant noodles looking at Karasu with an amused grin. "Just what do you think you're doing to my television?" he questioned placing the two steaming cups down on a nearby table, pushing a few piles of cards aside.

She jumped and looked back at him, then pointed to the box with a serious expression. "This guy. How did you capture him inside this little box? He's very strong. Did you beat him?"

Toka raised a brow then laughed a little as he shook his head. "I didn't capture him. He's probably just on T.V. That box lets you see things that are far away," he tried to explain where she would understand, taking a few steps closer and inspecting the screen. "It looks like, he's going to be in the Pro National League tournament. Is he a friend of yours?"

Karasu shook her head quietly, looking up at Toka curiously. She could sense something weird about him, like a power he was trying to hide inside of him, but why could she tell something like that about him? She couldn't remember at all. Toka walked back over to the table, taking one of the cups and handing it to her as well as a fork. "Well, you may as well eat up. You need to get your memory back soon. Otherwise i can't take you back were you came from."

"I don't want to go home . . that much I can remember . ." she thought to herself, looking down at the cup.

Someone knocked on the door of the apartment, and slipped a letter under the door with the name "Karasu" written on it.

Toka blinked and looked up at the knock, Karasu still amazed with the wonders of modern technology as she lifted some noodles from the cup with the fork. "What is this cup made from? It doesn't feel warm at all, but the soup inside is practically boiling."

Toka chuckled and shook his head, putting down his own cup to walk to the door, and noticed the letter on the floor and picked it up. "How did?--" he looked toward Karasu then the letter, handing it to her. "You got a letter. You should probably open it."

Karasu looked at the letter for a moment, then sat down her cup gently opening it as he said and reading it.

The letter reads as follows:

"Dear Karasu:

I know you don't think very highly of me after our little duel. Your organization is well known in the organization I'm in, P.O.D., which represents Professional Organization of Duelists. To the general public we're an organization that raises upcoming duelists, usually those who have graduated from dueling academies. We manage their schedules, help them with money issues sometimes, get them a home if necessary, help train them for duelings, and other such tasks. Although we have a side that the public doesn't see. You saw a part of this side today during our duel.

There are two points to this letter: The first one is to inform you that POD is now an enemy of the Chaos Knights; your goals interfere with ours, so you must be dealt with accordingly. I choose to spare you because you are really weak and I needed someone to deliver this message to, since we don't know where the hideout of the Chaos Knights is.

The second thing is this: You'll have a chance to get your revenge on me in the tournament tomorrow. A lot of POD members will be in that tournament, and the current duel champion is POD's #1 ranked duelist. We have a system of rankings in POD; I won't explain to you how they work though; I don't want you knowing too much. Although essentially the higher the rank the better duelist someone is usually. I hope you improve your dueling before the tournament; at your current level, you're no match for us. I'm rank #5, which means that 4 people are higher ranked then me, and that's not including some of the leaders of POD, although numbers #1 and #2 can fight on Par with them. If all the Chaos Knights fight on your level, then you should just wave a white flag right now."

Chuku Harunai

Karasu blinked looking over the letter once, then a second time. She stared blankly at the words as if trying to concentrate on their meaning; needless to say she was having a tough time understanding it. Toka watched her curiously, wondering what the letter was about. He wasn't so rude as to push her to know what was in the letter, but from the way she looked while she was reading it there must have been something seriously wrong.

"The strong guy from T.V says that I'm invited to the tournament," Karasu blinked, suddenly a wide smile appearing on her face. "He thinks I'm weak so he's wants me to participate to get stronger before I fight him again." She looked determined at least.

"Something tells me you might have interpreted your letter wrong.." Toka chuckled nervously, scratching his head. "But, if you're gonna be in the tournament I suppose I'll be seeing you there then. I'm supposed to be participating as well."

"That'd be so great Toka-kun! Then you could cheer me on when I win," She grinned, hoping out of the bed. She made her way over to the table that he had left her duel disk and deck, retrieving them both. "I think you misunderstood, that means we'd be- "

"My father will wanna see this, I have to take it back to him." Karasu interrupted, turning back to face him. "Will you let me visit your house again sometime, Toka-kun? I had fun!" She smiled and quickly made her way toward the door.

"Hey, wait. I don't even know your name yet." Toka called to stop her.

"Oh right, well. Everyone calls me Karasu, but tells me my real name is 'Ryoko'. Toka should call me that from now on." She replied, then opened the door to exit, quickly closing it behind her. Toka gave chase, realizing there were a lot more things he wanted to ask about, but when he got outside, she was already gone; no trace of her to be seen. "She was definitely a weird girl," he said with a sigh. "Heh, Ryoko huh? I'll remember that."