YuGiOh Vrains: SOL Tech Arc

That's just a Theory

"Yusaku! Over here," Aoi called. She and Miyu were waiting for him outside the school. Yusaku nodded a greeting and walked over to join them.
"I wasn't sure you'd come." the brunette smiled.
"Being home alone doesn't seem like the most practical thing right now." Yusaku shrugged. "And anyway I still-Can I help you, Sugisaki?"
"No, I'm good-Oh!" Miyu quickly pulled her nose out of his face.
"Sorrysorrysorry! I totally spaced, I thought you'd look different so I guess I thought I'd get a closer look, Slifer, I'm such an airhead!"
"I-it's fine, don't worry about it."
"You're not an airhead, I thought he'd be cooler IRL too." Takeru ran up with a grin.
"Homura! I thought you moved back in with your grandparents." Aoi smiled.
"I hopped on a train here last night." Takeru replied "Takeru's fine. I didn't want anyone at home getting hurt because of me. Besides, safety in numbers and all.
"In that case, feel free to call me Aoi."
"You're the fire kid,right? Aoi's told me about you, your deck is so cool, er, hot? Both sound kinda weird, I'm talking too much, aren't I?" Miyu babbled.
"Good to have you here," Yusaku smiled slightly at his friend
"Good to be here!"
"You can stop hugging me now."
"Sorry."
"The gang's all here!" Naoki Shima cried, "Fujiki, thank Ra you're safe! How did you get out of the Shadow Realm?"
"What are you talking about?" Yusaku cast a sideways glance at Aoi who shrugged helplessly.
"I told him you were visiting your cousin in Neo Domino City."
"I'm too smart to be fooled by that. You wouldn't have willingly broken contact with your best friend. Eggo, you must have been sent to the Shadow Realm."
Everyone was dumbfounded. Except Miyu, who's response was, "That's so cool!"
"I forgive you, Zaizen. I know you just didn't want me to worry...Where are you going?!"
"Sorry! We've gotta get to class," Takeru waved.
"We won't be at Duel Club today, so don't wait up." Aoi added.
"And it's 'ergo', not 'eggo'" Yusaku deadpanned.
"Hey, hey, you guys, wait up!" Naoki ran after them.
The hot dog truck was already busy when the friends arrived that afternoon. Go and Ryoken were already there, in addition to the Kusanagi brothers. Jin briefly looked up from the hot dog he was cooking to wave.
"Hey guys," Kusanagi called.
"Hi Kusanagi," They chorused
"Is Jin...good to be here?" Yusaku asked.
"I told him the basics," Kusanagi replied
"And I'm not interested in whatever your little cybercrime club is doing." Jin finished his brother's sentence.
"That was uncalled for," Go said, "We're not just a bunch of hacks."
Everyone groaned.
"Do us all a favor Onizuka," Ryoken muttered, not looking up from his computer, "Never open your mouth again."
"The world doesn't revolver 'round you, ya know."
Takeru snickered. "That one wasn't bad."
"Don't encourage him, Soulburner."
"Wait, you're...?" Miyu leaned over, "Wow, I think you're actually scarier this way, not that your avatar isn't scary, but you look like a Blue Eyes White Dragon, like, if she were a guy. It's kinda uncanny."
Ryoken rolled his eyes.
"Is Specter not here?" Aoi asked, slightly hopeful.
"He's with the Lieutenants and Pandor."
An unspoken, 'Thank Obelisk' passed through the group.
The sound of a motorcycle tore them away from their conversation. Ema pulled up, with Blood Shepherd hanging on to her for dear life. As soon they stopped, he ran to a nearby garbage bin to puke.
"Don't be such a drama king," Ema said.
"Don't drive like a maniac!" Blood Shepherd yelled.
"OK," Kusanagi interrupted, "Let's get started. I've been scanning VRAINS all day, but I haven't found hide nor hair of Windy's Origin."
"Assuming that's really who we're dealing with," Ryoken said, "Anyone could be behind that avatar."
"Of course it's really him." Takeru hissed, "He's a ghost!. He wants revenge because we survived and he didn't!"
"I don't think so," Akira approached the hot dog truck.
"What took you so long, honey?" Ema teased.
"I had to double check something," he kissed her on the cheek, "I'll make it up to you."
"You'd better."
Blood Shepherd cleared his throat.
"We were discussing our latest problem."
Akira nodded and pulled out his laptop.
"It took some digging, but I think I have a good idea of what might be going on." He pulled up a file labeled SUBJECT003.
"Stats, Notes, Duel Data, Igins Response, Behavior. What didn't they take down?" Kusanagi muttered.
"This isn't even all of it. There were also video files, predictions, simulations, even medical data. The only thing I couldn't find was, ironically, a name."
"It's Kazuto, Kazuto Tsubasa" Ryoken said quietly,"Not that it matters because he died two years ago. Baira was there when they brought in the body."
"You're right, Takeru, he's totally a ghost." Miyu said.
"If that's the case then we don't stand a ghost of a chance." Go quipped.
"Obelisk is punishing me." Blood Shepherd muttered.
"I don't think that's the end of the story." Akira pulled up an expense report.
"About two years ago Queen opened a project that's somehow still active even now that she's gone. Three guesses what it's called."
"Zephyr," Yusaku said
"Exactly. It seems unlikely to be a coincidence. I got the expense reports from accounting, and the money's been spent on nothing but medical and VR equipment, minus some 'incidental expenses' that I can only assume are bribes. I called R&D, but they didn't know anything about it. This is just speculation, but that kid might not have been dead when Dr. Taki saw him. A greased palm or two at the hospital is all it would've taken to get a death report faked. From there Queen is free to spirit him away."
"Sounds like your old boss," Ema said.
"That's it?" Blood Shepherd scoffed.
"That's it. Nothing about who's running it now, or even what it's trying to achieve." Akira confirmed, "The only other thing of note was that Red King reactivated an old warehouse last week. But he does suspicious things all the time, so that doesn't tell us anything."
"Well it's more than we had before," Kusanagi said hopefully, "Does anyone else have anything?"
"I sent the other Knights to scope out VRAINS." Ryoken said, "But they still haven't reported back."
"I attack with Motor Worm Spreader Queen!" Faust shouted. The three Lieutenants stood facing down three massive monsters. In addition to Spreader Queen, Necro Darwin was also on the field, and Crush Card Virus was active. The enemy's trap card activated. With the quick tribute of his monsters, the Knights' opponent wiped their field clean. Faust growled and ended his turn. The shadowy adversary smirked, and in a flurry of spell cards his monsters were back. The lieutenants barely got to scream as three consecutive direct attacks blasted them backwards and their shared LP dropped to zero.
"Specter...Pandor...I hope...you got away." Baira gasped as she lost consciousness.