<div style="text-align: center">May 10th<br/>
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Morning of the Mid-May Invitational Duel Monsters Tournament.​</div><br/><br/>A dazed Kaden had been on a train that was heading to the center of Domino City. With the view from the train windows, he could absently adore the city as the sunrise slowly began to crest over they skyline far away. It may have been very early, but Kaden was haunted by nightmares and he just couldn't manage to find some sleep. The chances of the men who were hunting him actually finding him were slim given that he was a totally different person now and on the other side of the planet. What was he afraid of? Even though he was a duelist who participated in the open contests each month, he just didn't perform well enough to be invited to participate in this invite-only contest today. He'd imagine that everyone who was had already received a letter of some sort and they were going to be there at some printed time.<br/><br/>As the train came to it's stop in a mostly empty plaza, the black coated and jeans wearing young man had worked his way through the nearest door and down some stairs. The darkness beneath his eyes and the hazy cloud of snoozing brain cells hadn't helped him much in his trek down the plaza that opened into the Stadium for the contest. While Kaden wasn't invited, he knew that he could probably pay for tickets to enjoy the contest from the stands. And with his luck, there were black suited men at the front of the building as they were preparing patrol perimeters.<br/><br/>The social phobias that mechanically constructed themselves inside Kaden had began to flare up as he approached these men casually. The fear of lying to them and being caught doing so when he just couldn't help it, it was always so overwhelming. The black coated man couldn't bring himself to make the final step. Guilt and embarrassment swallowed his poorly cobbled confidence as he turned and began to walk away before the suited security gentlemen even noticed he was there.<br/><br/>In his head, Kaden cursed himself as he rounded the building. If he couldn't work past this grief and guilt in his chest, then he'd never get any farther into building a life for himself here, in the city. Who would respect a dueling star or idol that couldn't tell their fans the truth? Nobody. Just as he grew closer to a suspiciously open door along the backside of the Stadium, Kaden paused and raised an eyebrow.<br/><br/>"Enter the door." A woman's whisper tickled at his ears. His messy hair covered them, and no one else was around, but the voice was clearly there. No compulsion forced his body to sneak around the open door and into the building. He simply dropped his feeble will power and carried through with the action calmly.<br/><br/>"Why are you asking me to do this?" He asked aloud, his voice matching his handsome body features, but mirroring his dark bags beneath his eyes and lazy sleepy posture. No response. Without fear, Kaden found himself traveling further into the side of the stadium as the hallway behind the door extended deeper than he imagined.<br/><br/>"You're alone. Sick and tired of a world you were never allowed to participate in properly from the beginning." The voice returned, softer and somehow longing as though they were physically close and yet Kaden remained the only person in the hallway.<br/><br/>"How do you know that?" Kaden weakly responded as his eyes traveled over the nearby doors for a sign of what might be going on. To his perception, there wasn't any evidence that this was some sort of prank. "What's going on here?"<br/><br/>"Follow your beaten and useless heart, Kaden. Find me and I'll gladly rob you of that guilt and give you the life you've been dying for all these years." The woman's voice grew slower and Kaden knew that to normal people, this whole event would be far too creepy or unbelievable. Other people would laugh or run off in terror at the sound of a voice in their head. Kaden continued walking deeper into the hallway. His dirty sneakers traveling along the cheap red rug of the floor as he passed numerous black doors on a white wall. This hallway had been almost hypnotically simple to his slow and aching eyes.<br/><br/>Before long, the door to an office slid open. There was a couch off to the right and the carpet of the floor had been a significantly higher quality. Slowly, Kaden entered the room and shut the door behind him. A busty blonde woman sat behind a giant wooden desk on the opposite side of the room. Her skin was hauntingly perfect and pale as her pantsuit, while hiding some of her curves, did little to hide her cleavage. Kaden couldn't think much further as he knew he was miles beyond his comfort zone.<br/><br/>"How about you lie down over there?" The woman asked, her voice clearly being the source that had echoed into his head, but sweeter and more human now. With a nod, The baggy-clothed Kaden stumbled to the cough and plopped onto his back. He didn't even blink as the tall woman entered his frame of view in an instant, which was jarring even as he couldn't imagine that she moved that fast. The woman's hand took to his chest as he looked up into her eyes. "I can make you better. No more pain. Don't you want that?" She asked as though she were speaking to a child.<br/><br/>Clearly Kaden didn't mind as he nodded slowly, his bangs partly covering his heavy drooping eye-lids. He free hand moved to adjust his bangs and hold his head. Her plush red lips curled upward on both ends now, she had these poor excuse of a man in her grasp now. "All you need to do is forfeit that pesky, whiny soul of yours. Can you do that for me, Kaden?" Her voice grew sweeter now, as it didn't matter and she knew she had him now. With another nod, Kaden let his eyes close completely as the woman's hand unfastened his coat and pulled up his white t-shirt to rest over his beating heart. His chest had been fit, and on the skinny side as her skin met his.<br/><br/>The struggling, silent duelist had lost his ability to remain tethered to reality as his eyes shut and his mind drifted into a welcoming and warm dream state. He wasn't awake at all as the woman somehow pulled what looked like a trading card from his chest. In this single action, all of Kaden that fought himself to keep others out of harm's way had left his body in that card. His 'soul' was gone, and good riddance.