A/N. SilvrSoleAlchmst1 helped me with this. She helps me with a lot of my writing. She has a formidable combination of attributes that make her a great person to go to for feedback: a sharp eye, a critical mind, a great sense of humour and enough patience to sink a battleship. Silver Sole, Thanks! (I hope I have managed to embarrass you right back – and I mean every word of it, too!)

Dearka's Problem

"Hey! That's great shooting, Athrun!"

I froze, my emptied gun still in my hand. I turned oh so casually. I recognised the voice. Rusty Mackenzie stepped out of the shadows. The bastard must have been watching from that dark corner, knowing that it is a blind spot for the shooter using the booth which I currently occupied. The position he'd taken up is good for observing the shooting, but the angle doesn't allow the observer to see the shooter, just the targeting system.

If he had surprised me, I certainly shocked him. It was amusing, in a way, to see the look on his face, when he saw who it really was. His jaw actually dropped.

"De-Dearka? That was you shooting?"

Hell, who said Coordinators were always intelligent? They can be as dumb and obvious as any Natural. Not that I've ever met a Natural in my 16 years of life, but this war is pretty strong evidence of their mass stupidity.

I grinned cockily at the gawking redhead. "Hey there, Rusty. What are you doing wandering around at night? Thought you'd be tucked up in your little bed."

I'd have been in bed myself, if I could. I don't like losing sleep. It's hard enough to come by in this place anyway. The ZAFT Academy's workload is huge, even by Coordinator standards. When you add up frequent night training exercises, study for the constant tests, and a modest social life, sleep gets squeezed out pretty often. But tonight was the night of the latest round of the marathon chess duel between Athrun and his nemesis, my silver haired room mate. The chance to slip away for some private practice at the shooting range had just seemed too good to miss. Too bad Rusty had evidently decided to use the same opportunity.

Rusty gave me that patent nice-guy smile of his. Irritating bastard. "I wanted to get in a bit of practice. I didn't think anybody else would be around this late at night. I didn't want to distract you so I waited till you'd finished before I said anything. That was amazing shooting, Dearka. It was so good, I just assumed it was Athrun…I mean he consistently has top score in the shooting tests and I just thought…Say aren't you currently lying fifth? You must have really improved recently. I'll bet you'll give Athrun some real competition in the next one!"

I let his enthusiastic blathering wash over me, while I quietly slipped my gun back in its holster and stripped off the fingerless gloves I favour for shooting. I kept the same bland smile pasted on my face the whole time. No way did I want this annoying twerp to know how uneasy I felt at being caught out like this. I felt irritated at his two-faced attitude, too. Of course he knew my position in the tests; he and Yzak were currently battling it out for the second ranking in marksmanship behind Athrun. Everybody at ZAFT Academy recognised the need to keep a look out for the guys ranked after you, as well as those ahead. He was probably cursing me behind that gentle smiling face, thinking I was going to shove him down to battling Yzak for third. Time to upset his calculations, then…

I smiled and shook my head ruefully. "Nah! I don't think that there's much risk to Athrun from me. This was just a fluke. Probably never happen again in my lifetime."

I smiled some more, and looked sincerely into his eyes. I am a damn good liar; I could immediately see the doubt wash through his expression. Not quite believing me, but definitely entertaining the idea. Good. When I got my usual not-quite-good- enough score in the next test, he would remember this conversation and my explanation would seem entirely credible.

I picked up my stuff and sauntered past him. "See ya, Rusty. Don't shoot yourself in the foot or anything!"

"Yeah. Goodnight, Dearka."

His voice sounded as if he wanted to say something more, but I guess my rapid exit cut off the opportunity for anything else. Which suited me just fine. Rusty Mackenzie is sharper than he looks; he's competing with the rest of us in the top echelon of our class, for one of those red coats they dangle in front of us like bait.

I walked moodily though the darkened grounds of the ZAFT Academy, going back to the dormitory room I shared with Yzak. I kicked out at any stray gravel I could find on the path as I stalked along. Anything to ease the sense of annoyance with myself. I should have been more damned cautious! To be caught out like that was galling.

I am not a normal Coordinator; I realised this about myself a long time ago. It doesn't bother me a bit. That's part of my abnormality, I suppose. The thing about Coordinators as a whole is that we are elitists both by nature and belief. Competition to demonstrate superiority is everything. It is the justification of our very existence as a biological group; it is the thread which runs through almost everything in our society. The drive to excel is the mark of the Coordinator. And I just don't have it.

So why do I sneak into the shooting range at night to practise but keep my public scores below the actual level of my ability? Why do I work hard to keep in the top group of cadets in my class, but carefully never come first at anything?

Well, I didn't say I was incapable; just not normal. I'm reasonably bright, even by Coordinator standards, but unlike everybody else around me, I don't give a damn. So everything would be just fine for me, I could relax and let things slide, except for one problem: his name is Yzak Joule.

Yzak is not a typical Coordinator, either. He is the extreme version of one; he is ultra-competitive, supremely ambitious, abrasively dismissive of anybody who is not able to keep up with him and deeply hostile to anybody who beats him. At anything.

Which leaves a laid-back arsehole like me with a problem. To be Yzak's friend I have to stay in what I privately think of as 'The Zone.' This means scoring well enough in tests for him to see me as something close to an equal; but at the same time never getting close enough to trigger his sense of rivalry. It's a fine line, and one I've successfully negotiated for nearly a decade now, all through our days at school together.

Till the damned war came and we wound up in the ZAFT Academy, where the sense of competition practically bleeds out of the walls. Ambition to be the best here is not just a philosophy, it is a religion. And not achieving doesn't just get you disrespected; it could actually get you killed.

So now I have to work even harder to stay in 'The Zone.' Unfortunately, that's not my only problem. Yzak has at last found a rival that he may not be able to beat, despite all his efforts. It dominates his training and even his limited leisure time. The struggle is taking a terrible toll on him. I wish there was something I could do to help, but the whole issue is an emotional minefield. Tonight's chess game was just one of a series that have played out between Yzak and Athrun Zala in the four months we have all been at the Academy. Yzak has yet to win a game; Yzak has yet to beat Athrun in any of our tests.

I decided to look in on the rec room on my way to bed. It was very late by now, so they had probably either finished or called it a night, but then you never knew…

The rec room was in darkness when I got there, so I threaded my way through the dim night-time hallways to our dorm room. Even before I commanded the light on, I knew it was unoccupied; I can usually sense immediately if Yzak is there. This did not look good. I knew the next most likely place he might be, but hoped like hell I was wrong. I stayed just long enough to hide my gun and gloves. I'd clean the weapon later when Yzak wasn't around….

I made my way to the communal showers on our floor. I swore softly to myself when I saw the crack of light under the door. As it swung open I breathed in the warm damp air from a running shower.

"Yzak! Are you in here?"

No reply. I didn't really expect one. I walked slowly down the block of shower stalls. The showers are semi-communal: each showerhead has its individual stall but they have no door or curtain on the front. I have two competing theories as to the reason for this strange arrangement: either the prevention of mass orgies or to stop cadets playing soap soccer. Or maybe it's both…? ZAFT Academy is full of weird little things like this.

As I expected, there was Yzak standing in the end stall, shoulders slumped under the pounding water.

"Hey, Yzak! Are you asleep under there?"

He made no reply. Just gave an irritated jerk of his shoulder, and kept his face away from me. This didn't look good, particularly the last item. If he had been crying…

"You're going to look like a prune if you stay in there much longer."

"Why don't you go away you bastard! I just want to take a shower in peace. Is that so much to ask?"

His voice definitely had the slightly furry quality I recognised from the few times I've actually witnessed Yzak cry. I was on the verge of agreeing to push off and leave him to purge himself of his frustration; it was pretty evident he'd lost again. Suddenly I caught a glimpse of something that turned my stomach cold. There were several small bloodstains on the tiled wall at the back of the shower where the water arching down from the showerhead didn't reach. They were just the right height to have come from the knuckles of Yzak's punching hand. I felt sick.

How did I know the blood was Yzak's, and even if it was his, that it didn't come from some random scrape? Because I had seen this before. When things get too much for Yzak, when his anger is more than he can contain, he lashes out. Not at people; well, not often. He tends to punch walls, trees, lockers…whatever hard unyielding surface he can find to take it out on. He's broken bones in his hands twice that I know of, and I suspect it has happened more often than that. He's pretty secretive about it. Like most Coordinators he has a high pain tolerance and heals fast, so I can't always be sure about the degree of damage that he's done.

What's got me worried now is the increasing frequency of these episodes since we joined ZAFT. The competitive atmosphere of the Academy is hyping up all his reactions, including this one. The other thing I'm worried about is the headaches. He's had them ever since we were kids; anybody who lives with the tension he puts himself under is bound to get headaches. Now they're more frequent. And if his grouchiness is anything to go by, a lot more severe. Of course the stupid prick doesn't admit to them, either. Stoic bastard.

I decided I had to provoke him out of the shower and back to our room.

"Yzak, if you don't get some sleep you're going to be kind of fuzzy-brained tomorrow. Don't forget we've live grenade practice in the afternoon. Alertness would be desirable, don't you think?"

His head turned and I got the patent Yzak Joule glare: eyes like two chips of blue ice.

"If you're afraid lack of sleep would impair my ability to handle weapons correctly then you're more of an idiot than I took you for, Elsman. Or more of a coward!"

I grinned happily back in the teeth of his snarl.

"Yep, that's me. I just tremble in my little ZAFT boots every time I see you with a grenade in your hand. If you don't get a good night's sleep I may even wet my pants tomorrow in sheer terror of what you'll do. So get out of the fucking shower will you!"

"Bastard!" Yzak yelled and hurled the only weapon he had at hand: the soap.

I managed to duck, just barely, and it hit the mirror above one of the hand basins on the far wall. I heard the mirror shatter with the impact. Yzak really does have an impressive throwing arm, even for a Coordinator.

I couldn't help laughing. The look of thwarted fury on his face was too much for me. He had really played into my hands now. I sauntered over to the cubby where he'd left his clothes and scooped them up. I dangled his uniform pants temptingly from one finger.

"I suggest you rinse off the suds and get the hell out of that shower. I'm leaving in about 30 seconds and taking this with me. If you don't want to make the trip to our room in a towel, you'd better move yourself now!"

His response was a burst of profanity and some detailed threats of what he would do to me when he got out.

I started to make a slow saunter towards the door, dangling the uniform invitingly.

"Well, time's almost up. We both need to get out of here, you know. If we're caught in here with that smashed mirror we'll both get given demerit points. You don't want that, and neither do I!"

I could see by the look in his eyes that I'd won. He hurriedly rinsed himself and turned off the shower. He snatched up his towel and was drying himself even as he came at me across the bathroom.

"Give me those you bastard!"

I tossed him the pants.

"There you go! I suggest you make do with that till we get back to the dorm room. Every second we're in here puts us at risk of discovery."

He glared at me while wriggling into his pants.

"It's your fault, you bastard. I wouldn't have thrown the soap if you weren't such an annoying jerk."

I grinned back at him over my shoulder as I left, still carrying his stuff.

"So you've been telling me for years. Should've got used to it by now, Yzak! Don't forget your boots – I left them on the floor by the cubby."

The door swung shut so I didn't catch his reply but I knew it wasn't good. That was fine by me. An angry Yzak who took it out in verbal abuse of me was better than one who smashed his knuckles against shower tiles.

He was only about a minute behind me in reaching our dorm room. A lot of his indignation seemed to fall away when he saw that I'd laid his pilfered cadet tunic and other stuff on his bed.

I had seen no-one in the hallway on my way back from the showers. When I asked if Yzak got clear too, I got an affirmative grunt. Relieved, I flopped down on my bed. For the moment I felt too wiped out to start the routine of putting myself to bed. Now that I had got Yzak back into the room, my anxiety for him and my sense of unease about Rusty's discovery of me, were making me feel tired and shitty.

For his part, Yzak had changed tack. From giving me a tongue-lashing of about 7.5 on the Joule scale, he'd abruptly gone quiet. I debated about teasing him some more, but decided it would do little good at this stage. Besides being tired as hell myself.

So I shrugged myself out of my uniform and crawled into bed in my boxers. Normally my sloppily discarded clothes and sleeping in my underwear would have been enough to provoke 10 minutes worth of the Joule bile, but all I got was the silent treatment.

"Goodnight, Yzak."

I didn't really expect a reply, so I turned on my side away from the light and shut my eyes. A few minutes later, after hearing Yzak doing his usual anal routine of hanging up his clothes and donning those satin pyjamas his mother insists on buying him, I heard him command the lights out. Neither of us said a word after that. I don't know when he got to sleep but I was out of it within minutes. Sometimes there's just too much stuff going on in my head; I think I have to lie and sleep to process it. Or maybe I am just the lazy jerk that Yzak calls me!

The next day we followed our usual routine and surprisingly, Yzak was actually speaking to me again. Well, if grunts and occasional barked insults count. Still, it was a good sign that he might come out of his huff sooner than usual so I carried on in my regular way. Till that bastard Rusty cornered me while walking back from the weapons practice ground.

Normally Yzak and I walked together, but he'd gone on ahead as per huff strategy number 32, or whatever number it had in his mental files. So I was dawdling along by myself, well behind the rest of the group, enjoying the quiet. Even with ear protection, a couple of hours of exploding grenades get kind of wearisome.

Rusty fell back from the others and waited for me to come up with him.

"Hey, Dearka. Can I talk to you?"

"I think you already are, Rusty."

"Yeah, OK. Very funny. I mean, can we have a…private conversation?"

He glanced over at the retreating backs of our classmates. They were far enough away now to make it impossible for them to overhear us. Rusty relaxed and gave me that little smile of his. I swear he practises it in the mirror. He probably got a book from somewhere with diagrams to tell him how to impress people with his sincerity.

"I've been having a look on the Academy Net. At your scores…I noticed…there's a statistically significant pattern…."

He dangled his little bit of verbal bait and waited for me to bite. I smiled my own patent happy-guy smile and scratched the back of my head in puzzlement for good measure.

"You're not making a lot of sense, Rusty. You didn't get too close to one of those grenades did you?"

Of course I knew exactly what the bastard was on about. He'd detected the pattern that betrayed my efforts to keep in 'The Zone.' The damned ZAFT Academy's open access e-board had made it easy for him. The marks for all assignments, tests, and exams were posted as soon as they became available. It even included the overall class ranking by each cadet's name, which would rise or fall, as the various scores were processed during the course of each day. All the cadets, particularly those near the top, were avid watchers of that scoreboard. I admit I found it useful myself for my own purposes.

"I just wanted you to know that I wouldn't say anything to anyone."

"About what?"

"About the pattern I found; about what I saw at the shooting range last night. I'd like to know why, Dearka. Why do you do it?"

He seemed sincere but be damned if I was going to admit anything to him anyway. If he kept his mouth shut, well and good. And if he didn't, I wasn't going to give him any more information than he had already managed to work out for himself.

"As I have no idea what you're talking about, I can't give you an explanation. Sorry about that."

He shrugged and smiled. "All right. I thought it wouldn't hurt to ask. I think I know why you do it, but I just wanted to confirm my theory. It's not a price tag on my silence though. OK?"

I shrugged and smiled, mirroring his gesture.

"I don't know what you're talking about of course, but if I were doing anything I'm sure I'd appreciate that."

He laughed. "You never give it up, do you Dearka!"

By tacit consent we started to walk back to the dormitories where the others had by now disappeared. Just about everybody heads straight for the showers after weapons practice. You can feel the dust and sweat from head to foot.

I thought it was over with, but Rusty had one last little verbal shot to fire.

"Do you think that Yzak has a chance against Athrun?"

"What, at chess?"

He grimaced and made a circular motion with his arm that indicated the whole landscape of the ZAFT Academy around us.

"I mean at everything."

I shrugged. I wasn't going to debate Yzak's chances with Rusty; after all, he was Athrun's room mate. I didn't know how friendly they were, but I was not saying anything that might get back to Athrun.

Rusty looked serious. "You and Yzak came from a regular school, not a military prep school, didn't you?"

"Yeah, so?"

He shrugged. "It makes a difference, you know. Athrun went to the best Coordinator military school on the moon. Nicol Amalfi and I both went to military schools here in the PLANTS."

They were the other top-scoring students in our class along with Yzak and me. So I guess it shouldn't have surprised me to hear that. And in the case of Rusty it didn't. But little Nicol as a military school student I found hard to believe.

"I'm surprised about Nicol. I thought he would have attended some fancy conservatorium of music. He's always talking about music; or listening to it. Probably drives his room mate crazy."

Rusty smiled. "Yeah, you'd think, wouldn't you? But with a father high up in ZAFT, I don't suppose Nicol ever got a choice in the matter."

He shrugged. "But that's not what I'm trying to say here. It's just that I thought you should know that Yzak is doing a remarkable job to come such a high second behind Athrun…but don't expect him to win."

I didn't respond to that and he looked increasingly uncomfortable.

"You heard about Athrun's mother being killed in the Bloody Valentine?"

I knew about it. Probably everybody knew it; the Zalas are among the high elite of the PLANTs. Everything about them is newsworthy. Lenore Zala's death had probably got as much coverage by itself as the whole of the rest of the nearly quarter of a million Coordinators who died that day. Including some of my father's cousins. I'd never met them, but still, they were Elsmans and another reason to despise the Naturals.

"Well, I don't think people realise how much her death is still affecting Athrun. He's a very quiet, private person….I've been his room mate for four months now, and you know I've never heard him laugh? He only talks about our training here, and not all that much of that! It's like he's emotionally shut himself off from everything."

I knew exactly what he was talking about. I went numb for about a year after my mother was killed in a freak accident when I was nine. I don't know what would have happened to me if I hadn't had Yzak to pull me out of it. For a long time he was the only person who could reach me. Not even my father…

I slapped down on that chain of thought. My lack of a close relationship with my father is not something I dwell on.

"Yeah, well, I'm sorry for the guy. But what does that have to do with our training here?"

"I think he's pouring everything he's got into his work here, as an outlet. Maybe the only outlet he's got over his mother's death. That's a phenomenal amount of mental and physical energy towards one objective. He's a very fine soldier, you know. I don't think Yzak can compete against that on raw ambition alone. That's all. I couldn't say this to Yzak, but I thought I would let you know. You're a good friend to him, Dearka. I can see that."

"I appreciate the thought, Rusty, but Yzak's his own man. He does what he does for his own reasons and I don't interfere."

"Yeah. But you may have to pick up the pieces. So I thought I'd give you a 'heads up' so you'd know the score."

I shook my head and smiled, though I seethed inside. How dared this bastard patronise Yzak like that, even if he claimed the best of motives!

"There won't be any pieces. Yzak's tougher than super-tungsten."

I was glad that we were at the dormitory entrance by then. I shook him off and made my way to our room. Yzak was there already, damp and shiny from the showers, lucky bastard. That was another thing to hold against Rusty. I had to fight the urge not to scratch myself, I felt so itchy and unclean in comparison.

"Hey Yzak, I was just talking to Rusty and he told me that Nicol went to a military prep school. Did you know that? I would never have guessed it about the little twit. I suppose it helps to explain why he's doing relatively well here, despite being a marshmallow."

Yzak grunted. I'd forgotten for a moment that I was still in the dog house. I smiled cheerily anyway, grabbed some clean clothes and went to hit the showers myself.

It wasn't till later that night, after our evening meal, that things unfroze between me and Yzak.

We'd each been working at our desks for a couple of hours when I noticed that Yzak was starting to move restlessly in his chair with increasing frequency. He's not a fidgety person, so this meant either he had something on his mind or was in some physical discomfit. I watched him out of the corner of my eye for a while. He kept rubbing at the back of his neck. Another headache coming on, I could tell.

"Uh, Yzak. Do you want a soda from the machine? I'm going to the rec room anyway so I could bring you one back if you like."

I thought I would just get a grunt in response to my offer, so I was surprised when he spoke.

"That damned stuff will rot your insides out, Elsman."

This was a peace offering, Yzak Joule style. I grinned.

"Yeah, I know. But I've got almost no other scope for vices in this place: there's no alcohol at all and there are only five females in the entire establishment. And one of those is a cook with a moustache thicker than my grandfather's."

I could see his mouth twitch with the effort not to laugh. People don't realise this about Yzak: he has a sense of humour. It's quiet and often very dark but it's there. Most people just don't get to see it like I do.

"You've never met your grandfather," he said, in mock accusation.

It was true. My Elsman grandfather had died when I was a baby. Mother's father was still somewhere on Earth, but he didn't count. The Natural bastard had divorced my maternal grandmother for wanting to have their unborn daughter made into a Coordinator. She'd gone ahead and done it anyway and got away clear to the PLANTs one step ahead of the legal writs to 'cease and desist.' She'd died before I was born. A pity. She was one Natural who might perhaps have been worth knowing.

"We have an excellent hologram of him on the mantel in my father's study. I assure you the detail is superb; you can practically count the individual hairs. But the cook's one is better."

Yzak laughed out loud. For the first time in days. And then winced and rubbed his neck again.

"I'll let you bring me a coffee, if you're going anyway."

The machine in the rec room produced the most horrible coffee I've ever tasted. Yzak had to be desperate indeed to consider drinking it. The powers that ran the ZAFT Academy considered kettles or coffee makers unsafe for cadets to have in their dorm rooms. We were training to be mobile suit pilots for fuck's sake! I did mention that the place had lots of little weird things about it, didn't I?

"OK. I'll see what I can do about coffee. It may be a while before I'm back."

He gave a weary smirk. "With that stuff, there's no rush."

By Yzak's standards this was sunny good humour. He deserved a reward. I resolved to get him something better than the slop from the machine. The kitchen staff did quite a lively illicit trade in thermos flasks of decent coffee. The tricky part was that the mess hall was out of bounds outside of meal times; demerit points for getting caught.

I'd done it before successfully and I managed it again this time. Slightly lighter in the pocket but hoping my gesture would cement a new-found peace back in the dorm room. I arrived back to find Yzak was no longer at his desk but lying on his bed with his arm over his eyes.

I stopped short just inside the door. You'd have to know Yzak really well to understand how abnormal this was for him. Yzak doesn't lie down and relax. He doesn't give in to things like tiredness or pain. He gets angry and he fights them. This body language was all wrong.

"Hey Yzak, I got you some coffee."

He pushed himself up on one elbow and looked at me blearily. I waggled the thermos invitingly in front of him.

"I decided to join you in the coffee and got us some of the good stuff from the kitchen."

He grunted and sat up. I gave him a cupful from the thermos and fetched the mug I kept my toothbrush in for my own share. I doubt there's ever going to be a market for peppermint flavoured coffee but it still tasted better than the machine stuff would have, toothpaste aftertaste or no.

We drank in comfortable silence. I debated with myself whether I should risk the peace that had descended on our little war zone. There was a subject that I had been hesitating over for a while now. It was probably going to kick me back into the deep freeze. I swallowed the last of my strange brew and took my chance.

"Uh, Yzak. Did you know that muscle control and maintenance of muscle fitness was an important part of any dancer's training?"

I watched the blue eyes widen.

"What the fuck did you put in your coffee Elsman? And you better not have put any of it in mine!"

"There's nothing in the coffee. I'm talking about what they taught me when I joined the Japanese fan dancing society at school. How to work with one's muscles so as not to damage them. Massage. Stuff like that."

The Joule eyebrows went up. "And this is relevant to coffee drinking…how?"

"Get your mind off the damn coffee, Yzak. I'm talking about massage – for aching muscles. Like backaches, headaches… that kind of thing."

"I see." The voice was silky quiet. "And this has something to do with me somehow does it?"

Now I'm for it.

"Yeah. I've been noticing lately that you rub your neck a lot. I think you've got tension in your neck and shoulder muscles. Probably some pain there and I'm guessing headaches, as a result."

"There's nothing wrong with me. Just keep your damn nose out of my business."

Yzak's defence mechanism is fast and tough, like a steel trap slamming shut. I was determined not to let him get away with things this time. I had to wring some sort of admission out of him, so I could get him to accept my help. Lots of luck with this, Elsman.

"It's not shameful to admit to the occasional headache, Yzak."

He glared at me and slapped the empty thermos cup into my hand.

"You can shove the rest of the damn coffee. I don't like the price tag that comes with it!"

"Yzak, if you were playing sport and got a muscle cramp in your leg, you wouldn't have any qualms about me helping to massage it for you, so you could carry on. What the hell's the difference between that and this? Headaches are not some sort of character weakness!"

"I never said they were. I just don't have a problem in that regard."

I felt like tipping the rest of the coffee over his silver head. Stubborn is Yzak's middle name. So I decided to fight dirty.

"I'm sure your mother would agree with me if I were to ask her opinion."

"You leave Mother out of this, damn you!"

Yzak has this complex relationship with his mother. She dotes on him, spoils him as much as he'll let her, but expects to make all the big decisions in his life. For the most part Yzak goes along with her, but he can only take so much of the coddling. Threatening him with his mother's devotion was a low blow and not something that I did lightly.

"I wouldn't dream of saying anything like this ordinarily, Yzak. You must know that! But things are getting tight here. We've got four months more of this crap to wade through before we graduate. You're in a highly competitive environment and I want to help give you any edge over that competition that I can. This is something I can do, but you've got to let me…you've got to let me in, damn it. Into your personal space!"

And that was the heart of the matter. Yzak is not a touchy feely person. I'm more tactile myself. Not that I get many opportunities. My father and I don't have a 'hugging' kind of relationship and I've no siblings or other close relatives. That's one of the things I really like about girls. They're great to touch…but I don't want to drift away to other topics.

Yzak didn't immediately jump down my throat at that last remark. This was a hopeful sign.

"I don't have a problem. But if you think it would help my fitness…maybe it's worth trying." Yzak was very careful to sound indifferent.

I felt exhilarated. This was a major breakthrough. I grabbed Yzak's discarded cup and filled it from the thermos, topping up my own mug with the last of it. I raised my mug in a victory toast.

"Let's do the bastards down, Yzak! Every one of them!"

We solemnly clinked cup and mug and drank the now tepid brew. It was still better than the machine crap.

When the coffee was done, I was determined to make a start. I would stand a better chance of getting Yzak to cooperate long-term if I didn't give him time to change his mind. Once he found that a massage was a positive experience, I wouldn't have to fight as hard to get him to have more.

"OK, Yzak. Lie down on your stomach on the bed. You'll have to strip to boxers and undershirt, too."

For a moment I thought he would balk. He gave a mutinous frown but then he snorted and nodded reluctantly. "All right. I said I'd try it. Might as well get it over with."

He undressed and lay down as I had asked. I spent the next twenty minutes working on him, even doing a little with his calf muscles and feet.

"Why the hell are you bothering with my legs?"

"It's all connected, Yzak. I'll mostly concentrate on your back and neck, though."

He just grunted by way of reply. His question about his legs was the first time he'd spoken since I started. I suspect he didn't talk at first through feeling self-conscious. I'd like to think that his continued silence was a sign that he was enjoying it, but Yzak would never actually admit to that. His back and shoulders certainly seemed less tense, though.

But what was Yzak's mental reaction? I'd only know how he felt by his response to the idea of another massage in the future.

"Well, I think that's enough for a start. I'll get hold of some massage oil and next time you can take off the undershirt, too."

"You're not making a mess with some perfumed muck, Dearka. I never agreed to that!"

"Don't worry. I'll be sure to get hold of some scent-free oil and I'll steal some towels for you to lie on. It'll be fine, Yzak. You might even like it!"

"Huh! I doubt it. But I'll go along…for now, anyway."

I concealed my mild astonishment. By the Joule boy's standards this was enthusiasm.

"Gee, thanks Yzak! I appreciate that!" I gave him a big cheery sarcastic smirk.

"Arsehole!" He put his uniform back on. "I've had enough of this room for a while. Want to take a stroll around the grounds before bed?"

This was as close to 'thank you' that Yzak could bear to utter without feeling that he was betraying personal weakness.

"Sure, Yzak. Or maybe we can swing past the rec room? There might be a pool table free."

"I don't care. Either way. Just let's go."

In order to observe him, I deliberately walked a little behind Yzak as we set off through the hallways. His relaxed body language told me what I wanted to know. My 'problem' was feeling better. Maybe we had a chance of getting through ZAFT Academy after all, without Yzak driving himself crazy.

My heart was certainly lighter at that thought, and at the knowledge that he trusted me enough to accept my help. That was a really big concession from Yzak, and I felt warmed by his opening up to me like that. Not that I would ever admit my reaction to the prickly bastard, of course. I pictured the comical expression of revulsion that would appear on Yzak's face if he ever suspected me of such 'mushy' thinking.

Smiling at the back of his oblivious silver head, I picked up my pace to get closer to him, while still leaving him slightly in the lead. Like always….

A/N. I have not been able to find a canon source that confirms the name of the ZAFT training establishment, but I have used the name ZAFT Academy. The wonderful site GUNDAMOFFICIAL dot com provides the canon information that Athrun and Yzak joined ZAFT on 21 Feb CE.70 and that Athrun joined the Le Creuset team, along with Yzak, Dearka, Nicol, and Rusty, on 20 Sep CE 70. Therefore there is an eight month period when they were all in training together. I think this is a great opportunity to look at their lives before the attack on Heliopolis. I invite other writers to consider doing stories set in this interesting period. The above-named site has an excellent timeline of the battles and political developments going on throughout the Gundam Seed era, including the 'ZAFT Academy' period, if anybody wants ideas for background events. Though I should warn those who have not yet seen Gundam Seed Destiny that the site also has lots of spoilers for the second series!