A/N: For Kittyclaw, who I had the honour of writing for in XL's Summer Santa. She's a wonderful writer and if you haven't been reading her fics, you should. :3
Portraits
[ Art washes from the soul the dust of everyday life. - Pablo Picasso ]
/
Odd was doing homework.
Aelita watched him, bewilderment plain on her face, and wondered for a moment if she hadn't fallen asleep and stumbled into a dream. But sure enough, Odd was doing homework, and to make matters even stranger he was doing it early.
Not the kind of early that was breakfast-time before the bell rung for class, or even the early that was three o'clock in the morning after a night playing video games, but the most reasonable kind of early – a late Sunday morning. Odd sat at his and Ulrich's shared desk, surrounded by pencils and paper, scribbling furiously away.
"May I come in?" Aelita asked, standing at the open door.
He turned around immediately and his face broke into its customary grin as he beckoned her over.
"Of course you can, Princess. Pull up a seat!"
She did so and found a space at the side of the desk to perch her elbows, still with that bewildered expression.
"Odd, are you feeling okay?" Aelita asked cautiously, peering into his face for signs of upset or fever. All she was met with was an amused and curious expression as he slowly set down his pencil.
"Yes..." he replied cautiously. "Why, what's up?"
"You're doing... homework?"
"Oh, yeah. It's due tomorrow."
Aelita blinked at him but he had picked up his pencil again and resumed note-taking in his rarely-seen, untidy scrawl, and he didn't notice.
"This is the boring part," he said with a shrug, without looking up. "I have to write a paragraph about the piece I chose to do and why." Then, "it's for art class," he added in explanation.
"Oh."
Aelita stared around at the pile of sketchbooks and notepads, scattered pencils, pens and a small palette of acrylic paints. Odd's homework planner, was buried beneath the pile. It seemed to grow more dog-eared by the day and the tattered state of it was a sharp contrast to the neatly kept art supplies. Aelita had never seen any position of Odd's kept in good condition, besides what lay in front of her.
"Can I see your... piece?" she asked hesitantly, unsure of the word. To her immediate surprise, Odd froze, only slightly, before relaxing.
"Sure," he said offhandedly, pulling a large piece of paper from the pile without looking and passing it across to her. "It's not quite finished... I need to do another layer so the paint can dry in time for tomorrow."
Aelita stared down at the page and gasped.
"Odd!"
"Hmm?"
"This is wonderful!"
She recognised the scene immediately; it was an oil painting of Kadic, their usual spot by the benches with the shrubbery and school building in the background, vividly wrought in browns and greens. Her eyes scanned the portrait and picked out all the little details, a smile lighting on Aelita's face as she spotted five familiar figures; two heads of blonde – one tinged purple – one of pink, one of black and one of brown. Beside them, a small grey four-legged shape.
"Thanks," Odd said, his eyes still fixed on his page of notes, but his pencil had long since stopped moving and his mouth was pursed in a barely restrained smile. Aelita would have called him embarrassed, if she thought the perpetually confident Odd ever capable of such a thing. Carefully, so as not to smudge the painting, she placed it back on the desk though her gaze still lingered admiringly upon it.
"You know, I've never really seen any of your artwork," Aelita said thoughtfully.
"You see my drawings all the time!"
She considered this and thought back to their last lesson together, Friday's double math, where she had watched with undisguised amusement as Odd doodled on his notebook. He had pushed aside his worksheet in favour of a beautifully rendered portrait of Kiwi wearing a jet pack, shooting lasers from his eyes to nuke an unsuspecting Sissi. The caricature of the principal's daughter bore a spot on her chin which was a gross exaggeration of the one her real life counterpart had woken up with that morning. Nicholas and Herb floated goggle-eyed in the background, tentacles sprouting from their heads.
Ulrich had glanced over and just barely suppressed a snort of laughter; Jérémie had given them all a disapproving look before returning to his equations.
"I suppose so," Aelita conceded, thoughts returning to the present, "but none of these serious pieces." Her eyes drifted longingly once more to the Kadic landscape painting and she heaved a sigh. "I wish I could draw."
"Can't you?"
"I wouldn't know how. All I know is computers. I'm not human, remember?"
Odd tipped his head slightly to the side and scrutinised her. "Don't let a little thing like that stop you, Princess!"
"But-"
"No buts! Here!" In approximately two seconds, the thoughtful artist persona was tossed aside – probably never to be seen again, Aelita thought - and Odd was back in his usual state of exuberance. He grabbed a sheet of paper and pencil and thrust them towards her. "Draw something!"
"Like what? Odd, I can't just-"
"'Course you can! Hey, I know, you can draw Kiwi!"
The dog, dozing thus far unnoticed in the corner, looked up at sound of his name and wagged his tail. Hesitantly, Aelita sat cross-legged on the floor in front of him and began to make shapes on the paper. Unfortunately, at the sight of one of his favourite people – his most favourites of course, being Odd and Ulrich, and the others being Jérémie, Yumi and Sissi (who was terribly fun to chase) – Kiwi leapt up and began to cover her hand in affectionate licks until Aelita tossed the paper aside in despair and gathered the dog up into her arms.
"This would be a lot easier if you stayed still," she chided the animal affectionately, giggling as Kiwi responded by licking her face.
Odd planted himself beside them and Kiwi paused, torn between the two children. His primary affections - coupled with the usual promise of treats in Odd's pocket – won out, and the dog clambered from Aelita's lap to sniff curiously at his owner, who automatically pulled a biscuit from his pocket. Kiwi crunched up the treat in two seconds flat and began to paw hopefully at Odd's pockets once more.
"Maybe Kiwi was a little ambitious," Aelita suggested.
"I started out drawing Kiwi," Odd confessed.
Aelita was struck with a mental image of a tiny, much younger Odd, sprawled on the floor with his tongue poking out of the side of his mouth in concentration as he scribbled a stick figure Kiwi in crayons. She grinned to herself and as she watched her friend across the room, Aelita had another sudden thought. Reaching once more for her pencil and paper, she turned over to the back and drew a circle...
/
"Oh. It's not bad at all."
"Odd," Aelita said warningly.
"I'm serious, Princess! I had no idea you could draw so well. That's a really good picture of a Creeper."
"It's supposed to be you," Aelita said flatly.
Odd clapped his hand over his mouth to hide his grin. "Oh. In that case, well, uh..."
They were interrupted by a sudden knocking.
"Hey, what are you two doing?" Yumi asked as she peered around the half-open door. She stepped into the room without invitation, out of habit, and settled on the edge of Ulrich's bed. "Did you do that butternut squash, Aelita? Strange thing to draw, but it's still really good!"
"It's supposed to be... Never mind," Aelita sighed, as Odd rolled back on the floor, laughing, and Kiwi immediately leapt on top of him. Yumi shot them both a puzzled look before shrugging to herself and taking up her own piece of paper.
"Can I join in?"
"Sure," Odd gasped, pulling himself upright, whilst Aelita took to staring critically down at her own drawing attempt, turning it upside down and then right-side-up again with an increasingly large frown. How could they not tell what it was? Sure, the head was a little strangely shaped, but...
"Smile, Aelita! And hold still so I can draw you."
Aelita blinked and looked up to where Yumi was calling her. The older girl began to make quick pencil strokes, glancing up now and then to examine her subject. Yumi didn't notice Odd's own concentrated gaze directed at her as he began a sketch of his own.
/
"Okay, let's see."
"Just a few more lines... hang on..."
"Yumiiii!"
"Okay, okay, keep your hair on Odd. I'm done."
Yumi held up her paper and Aelita clasped her hands together in delight. "Yumi, that's really good! It looks like me and everything!"
Yumi's shoulders hunched up slightly in a modest shrug. "Thanks Aelita. I'm not as good as Odd, though. Speaking of..." she turned her gaze expectantly to the blond boy and he held out his paper with a flourish.
"Ta da!"
Yumi's jaw dropped. Aelita's face twisted in confusion.
"Odd... what is that?"
Odd shrugged. "I'm trying out a new style, that's all. And you were my first subject, congratulations!"
The girls continued to stare at his sketch. It was Yumi all right, but rendered strangely in sharp, cartoonish angles. The longer she stared at the picture, the more her face reddened.
"That's frankly insulting Odd. No way is my forehead that big!"
Odd ducked just in time as his black-clad friend threw an eraser at him. "Draw a nice picture next time!" she commanded. "With real proportions!"
"You just don't appreciate artistic license," Odd grumbled as he crossed his arms.
"Who doesn't appreciate artistic license?" a voice asked, tinged with amusement, and all three heads turned towards the door. "And how's the art going Odd? Finished the only homework you've ever bothered to do on time, yet?"
"Hi Ulrich!" they said in unison. He nodded to them all and sat down on the bed next to Yumi, peering over her shoulder at her drawing of Aelita.
"That's amazing."
Yumi turned away to hide the faint blush that crept up her cheeks with a mumbled "Thanks."
"What have you two drawn?" he asked Odd and Aelita. Aelita grudgingly held out her sheet.
"Ignore the back. I tried to draw Kiwi but he kept jumping on me. And the front is-"
"I didn't even know you'd seen Alien," Ulrich interrupted her, staring at her picture admiringly. "That's a cool drawing."
"What's Alien?" asked Aelita. "It's supposed to be-"
But Ulrich caught a glimpse of Odd's drawing and he leaned over, unintentionally cutting her off. The brown-haired boy's face creased in confusion as he tried to get a proper look.
"Is that supposed to be Yumi?"
"Don't look at it!" Yumi yelled, and snatched the picture out of Odd's hand. He protested loudly but Yumi folded the sheet and tucked it into her pocket with a grimace.
Aelita caught Odd's eye. They both grinned. All was quiet for a short moment until Aelita crossed over to the desk and returned with a fresh stack of paper.
"Would you like to draw something, Ulrich?"
"Oh, I don't know..."
"Come on!" the other three urged him.
"Well, all right..."
The morning continued thus, giving way to afternoon to the sounds, alternately, of concentrated silence and impressed exclamations. The room was soon flooded with scraps of paper, doodles were torn up and pencils were chewed – and this was only partly Kiwi's doing – and Aelita found to her frustration that she stillcouldn't draw to her satisfaction.
"I'm really, really sorry Ulrich. I can't draw, you know."
"Mine's not much better either, Aelita. I hope you're not too offended."
"Yumi, stop staring at Ulrich and finish your drawing so we can switch already."
"I am not staring, Odd! I just need to get the lighting right, that's all."
"Sure..."
Presently, and another knock on the door later, Jérémie joined them on an extremely rare break from computer coding and research. He seated himself amongst the chaos with an indulgent smile and reassured Aelita that he wasn't an artist either. He had his own style though, and as Aelita became aware of this she noticed that everyone did.
Jérémie went for precise lines, ruler-straight, the result of drawing naught but diagrams in Science classes. Ulrich's lines were bold and uncertain, the result of a tight pencil grip and too much concentration. Yumi, almost as good an artist as Odd, sketched light pencil lines and refined them neatly, smudging the graphite with her thumb to create tones and shadows. Odd's style changed with each drawing as he subjected portraits of the others to his artistic experiments, something which strangely allowed his versatility and talent to shine through as much as if he'd been taking things seriously.
At times like these it was easy to forget about everything else. That they were part of a war, that she wasn't really real. She didn't even really mind, in the end, that she wasn't too great at art.
/
Nonetheless, Aelita was determined to practise. Unfortunately one obstacle lay in the way of Aelita and artistic prowess, and that obstacle suddenly decided to launch seven consecutive attacks, one for each day of the following week.
By the end of it the Lyoko warriors' nerves were frazzled; Jérémie swore he'd worn his fingers practically to the bone with frantic typing and with half a dozen returns to the past they all forgot what day it was on more than one occasion. Not to mention all the homework that piled up over the week. Even Aelita got reprimanded for a missed assignment, and she finally discovered first hand why Odd and Ulrich declared detention the worst of humankind's creations (the best, of course, being bendy straws and two-for-one pizza meal deals).
When Ulrich and Yumi went to vent their frustrations over a spar and Jérémie decided he could spare a couple more hours researching the anti-virus, Aelita took a walk through the woods to stretch her legs after a long hour of silent library confinement.
She found herself, quite unintentionally, walking in the direction of the Hermitage.
Pausing outside the gate, Aelita cast a cursory glance around to check she was alone before she entered the dilapidated house with a creak of the front door, watching her footsteps stir up dust clouds in the floorboards as she wandered into the dimness. There was something eerie about the house, yet something which drew her to it all the same; something comforting, laced with nostalgia.
Aelita sat down in one of the front rooms, finding for herself one of the least dustiest sofas, and sat down with a sigh, savouring the first truly peaceful moments she'd experienced in days.
"Thought I'd find you here."
Aelita spun around at the voice, her shoulders sagging in relief as she saw it was only Odd slipping casually through the doorway behind her.
"You scared me," she admitted.
"And the creepy abandoned house didn't?" he teased.
She knew he was joking but she still shook her head, brow creasing in thought. "It's not all that scary to me. There's something strange about it. I feel like I know this place. Like I've been here before."
Odd shrugged. "We have passed by it a lot."
"It's not that, it's... What's that?" she asked suddenly, distracted as Odd set down the backpack he had been carrying and began unloading its contents.
"I was gonna do some sketches, and I brought some paints too. Drawing with you guys the other day made me remember how fun it was outside of assignments. How are things with you anyway, Princess?" he asked conversationally as he tipped small pots of paint, brushes and sketchbook out onto the floor.
"Stressful week."
Odd laughed good-naturedly. "Tell me about it. Sometimes I feel like XANA's trying to break a record or something."
"What, for 'most attacks launched in a week' or 'stupidest attacks ever'?"
"Both! I mean, come on. I can only see possessed Sissi so many times before I start to realise she isn't that much different from the original."
"It's easy to tell the difference really."
"Oh yeah?"
"Yeah. Possessed Sissi makes much more intelligent conversation."
Odd snorted with laughter and with a slightly shaking hand he passed her a paintbrush.
"Here. It might go better than the drawing."
"Thanks." She stared down at it. "But I don't know how to paint either."
"You take your brush and dip it in the paint pot and – voilà!" Odd demonstrated with a flourish, covering his own paper with a wash of deep blue. Aelita twirled her own paintbrush around her fingers.
"I feel as though there should be more to it. It's so imprecise. There's no right or wrong answer like with a math equation. Things don't line up neatly."
"That's half the fun! You can do whatever you want. And the more you do, the better you get."
"That's why you draw in class so much."
"I'm never going to use Chemistry anyway," he pointed out defensively.
"You never know. It might just save your life one day."
"Well when it does, I'll just call you or Einstein. There! Problem solved!"
"Always an answer for everything," Aelita mumbled under her breath, and Odd, leaning closed enough to hear, grinned.
It wasn't a prime spot for drawing, with the floor covered in years' worth of grime and dust, but they pulled the tarpaulin from a nearby table and spread their things over it, sitting in the light that poured in from the broken window.
It seemed the most obvious thing to each paint the scene before them and so that was what they did. Aelita focused on a tangle of wild flowers in the foreground of her page, trying to emulate the curl of vines that draped themselves over the moss-covered windowsill. Frustrated grumblings pushed themselves past her lips until Odd paused and leaned over to see what the problem was.
"I'm trying to do this one line," Aelita explained as Odd skirted around the edge of the table to lean over her. "See, the way the vines twist like that?"
"Uh-huh. Here, Princess-"
He reached out, closed his warm hand over hers and in a single deft brush stroke he perfected the line she had been agonising over.
"There!" he said, releasing her hand at last.
"Thanks," she replied, nodding approvingly at the picture.
"When it becomes a masterpiece, wanted by museums worldwide, I want a cut of the profits."
She rolled her eyes at him, flicking her hand – the one that held a paintbrush still laden with paint – at the same time. A blob of green flew through the air and Aelita burst out laughing as it landed on Odd's nose.
"I-I'm so- sorry," she squealed breathlessly as he stared, cross-eyed, at the incriminating paint splotch. Then, "Oh no, Odd, don't even think about it! I'm serious!" as he grabbed his own brush and a fresh pot of paint.
She failed to duck in time; her clothes and face and hair were spattered with specks of deep purple.
Odd said "Sorry!" with an entirely unapologetic grin.
Soon they were flicking paint mercilessly at one another, ducking and rolling behind the furniture for cover. Nearby birds were startled out of their trees and most of the wildlife that had made the abandoned Hermitage their home were frightened away, perhaps forever, but neither Odd nor Aelita noticed.
"Isn't this vandalism?" Aelita called at one point from across the room, peering out from the relative safety wardrobe with her paintbrush poised like a weapon at her side. The walls, floor and somehow the ceiling were covered with multicoloured splashes.
Odd shrugged. "Tastefulvandalism. Makes all the difference." He personally liked what they'd done with the place. It was more tasteful than the graffiti covering the walls at any rate.
Shortly after that the paint finally ran out; when they paused to rest, leaning back against opposite sides of the wall, Aelita studied her friend. Messy-haired and covered in dust and paint, he looked-
"Terrible," she declared. "Though I suppose I don't look too good myself."
After a few minutes of searching she found a mirror in the corner, covered with a sheet. She pulled the sheet away and ran her hand over the dirty surface, peering at her reflection in the clean spots her fingers made. Aelita raised surprised eyebrows at her own haphazard appearance; pink hair in complete disarray, paint and dust and grime smearing her face and clothes. Beneath it all her cheeks were flushed with exertion and her grin was fixed on her face.
Rubbing her face with the back of her hand, Aelita attempted to organise her matted hair. Meanwhile, Odd approached and stood behind her, bracing his arms on her shoulders and resting his chin on top of her head studying their reflections as well. A rare thoughtful expression crossed his face.
"What did I tell you, Princess? Things don't always have to be all neat and stuff to be beautiful."
Aelita turned from their reflections to look up into Odd's face, mouth twisting in a bemused smile.
"How do you come up with this stuff?"
He shifted slightly to the side and sat down heavily on the floor beside her, stretching out his legs to that the heel of his shoe met with that of his mirror image.
"What, a guy can't be sincere for once?"
"Not you," she teased. "It's your job to keep us in bad jokes forever."
But she wrapped her arms around his waist, hugging him tightly, and he rested his head atop her hair as he breathed deeply of the smells of earth and drying paint.