Binas: Thanks for everyone who has stayed on stand the whole time. Here is the updated version of chapter two.
Reviews:
erica phoenix16: I am too. I am doing my very best to fix up what I can and make the story more enjoyable. Also, your comment from way back when about Brina, it is very true. Not many people write characters who have Autism. I think it has to deal with the standards put into place by censors, which sucks because typically autistic characters can help teach kids that we are just like everyone else, we just have a couple of quirks that bring in variety and long lasting friendships that are backed with loyalty.
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Danny was not amused with this at all. Skulker, the metal guy, had stooped to a petty level that no one could see coming, for what he assumed was the lack of a pelt of a half-ghost in his lair. He was not only going to scold him beyond belief but make sure he never did anything like that again. Skulker had crossed the line this time and actually made someone suffer along the way.
And the second thing on his mind was Brina herself. No one had ever discovered his secret so quickly. How she did it, he was going to ask her about later without a doubt. And right now, he had to hope she would at least be capable to keep secrets. From what he saw in her room, nothing suggested that she could.
"Why are you angry?" Brina asked as she began sitting up, "Did I do or say something wrong?"
Danny looked at her and said, "No. You didn't do anything wrong."
A piece of hair fell into Brina's face, and her eyes instantly went as wide as dinner plates. She grasped her pigtails and shoved them in her eyes. She then grabbed her skirt and then frantically lifted up her tank top. She began screaming as she continued to look at herself from various angles, trying to make sense of not just the change in appearance, but the fact felt even less comfortable in her own skin.
"What the hell did that hunk of metal do to me?!" Brina exclaimed, "I told him was not anyone's tool! I proved that by being a complete pain in the ass! That freaking asshat! Damn him!"
Danny watched really uncomfortably as Brina begun using her words to rip herself apart. He knew he freaked out when this happened to him, but this… This was something else. It was painful to watch, and there was no way that a freak out could get this bad. He just knew it. He tried to talk to her, but her mouth kept going at a mile a second.
Once he got an opening, Danny said, "Look, can you please calm down?"
"Calm down?! CALM DOWN?!" Brina yelled, looking rightfully angry. "I was already a freaking freak due to being autistic! I know whatever the hell happened to me will not only get me kicked out again, but not even an orphanage would want me now! I did not need the world to remind me that it hates me and is out to get me!"
At that moment, Danny thanked whoever controlled the universe that Jazz had entered the lab. He was not sure how much longer he could handle the dramatic scene that Brina was making.
"What happened?" Jazz asked, "I heard screaming!"
"Apparently Skulker grew impatient and decided to find a substitute." Danny stated, "Now I've got Miss Drama Queen here screaming my ears off."
Jazz moved towards Brina, who was still having her meltdown, and grasped her by the shoulders, making sure that was done gently and softly. Brina looked at Jazz with tears flooding from her eyes.
"Cool it, screaming and crying isn't going to fix this." Jazz said firmly, doing her best to make sure she did not set anything else off.
"But…" Brina trailed off.
"No buts." Jazz said, "Danny already knows what this is all like. He went through what you went through except it wasn't caused by a crazy ghost. We aren't going to let anything like that happen to you again, okay?"
Danny looked at Jazz, wondering how she managed to talk to Brina when she was in the state of mind. Then again, Jazz likely knew how to deal with people with similar issues that involved the brain. She was the one preparing to become a psychologist after all.
"You promise?" Brina asked.
"I promise." Jazz said with a smile as she pulled Brina close.
Brina appeared to be uncomfortable with the hug at first, but gradually accepted it. It was comforting and made some of the anxiety go away. She felt herself calm down to the point the sniffling stopped. Once her tears dried up, a blue halo appeared and reverted her back to normal. Well… Almost normal…
"GAH!" Danny yelped with full blown disgust as he diverted his eyes away from Brina, "GO PUT SOME CLOTHES ON!"
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A few minutes after the three of them left the lab, Danny had reverted back to his human form. That was when he and his sister did their best to make sure Brina (who was now wearing the clothes she arrived in minus the shoes) knew what ghosts were exactly so they knew where to start with everything she needed to know. Unfortunately, they had to explain a few things as she kept getting confused what they actually were and how they were portrayed in fictional media. She eventually caught on, but still far from perfectly accurate. One thing that she could get right was that they were a lot like people in the fact they could emote, eat, sleep, bathe, and think for themselves.
Aside from that, after Jazz had gotten Brina back to down to reality, she seemed to be accepting of what had happened a bit faster than Danny did at first. She didn't say anything among the lines of "I don't want these powers", instead she said "As long as my routine and passion are not affected, I am okay". She even said that while the hand she used to prop her head up turned invisible. During that power glitch, a hard-to-decipher look was present on her face. They couldn't tell if she didn't care or just didn't notice.
Eventually, Jazz left the room, believing Danny could take things from here for the moment. That was when he refreshed the video chat window that had timed out and found Tucker moping in his window and Sam waving Tucker's PDA in her's.
"Cut that out and give Sasha back!" Tucker whined. "I still have payments on her, ya know!"
"What was that?" Sam asked tauntingly, "I didn't hear you."
At that moment, Danny butted in and asked, "Okay, what happened while I was gone?"
"I confiscated his PDA for putting those videos on my computer." Sam said with a sly smile.
Tucker continued to pout, "She's been teasing me with Sasha ever since we restarted the webchat! I don't know how much longer I can take it!"
"Tuck, there are more important things going on than your technology obsession." Danny pointed out.
"Then tell us!" Tucker said, looking a bit irritated, "The suspense is killing me! And no! Don't you dare put lipstick on Sasha, Sam!"
Before Danny could tell them what had happened, Brina unknowingly invaded his personal space as she leaned over that back of the chair Danny was sitting in, with a bit of a head tilt.
"Who are these guys?" Brina asked.
Sam and Tucker stared at their webcams. Tucker was confused (with a bit of a flirtatious sparkle in his eyes) while Sam raised an eyebrow, looking for answers to questions that she knew Danny was getting a hint at.
"Okay, first of all, that's Brina, the girl my parents adopted." Danny said, "Second, I was right, she is a lot sharper than most people in Amity Park."
Then Brina's upper body lost tangibility, causing her to fall to the ground, raising more unspoken questions.
"And you can thank Skulker for why she has ghost powers now…" Danny sighed.
"You lost me at 'thank Skulker'." Tucker said.
"Danny, how exactly is Skulker connected to this?" Sam asked, a bit confused herself.
By this point, Brina had regained solidity in almost everywhere, but her right arm. With a bit of curiosity, she moved it around before sticking it into the floor and wiggling it around. She then decided to try grabbing things, which were all fails and eventually lead to her accidentally turning Danny's chair intangible as he was explaining what had happened as far as he knew. As a result, he fell out of the chair and gave an annoyed look at Brina. Brina gave a sheepish look and a shrug of her shoulders.
"Will you cut that out?" Danny asked.
Danny then got up, grabbed Brina's now solidified hand and moved her to another portion of his room, hoping she would stop causing distractions. As soon as he returned, Tucker began snickering while Sam had a small smile, probably thinking back to the first month.
"Looks like teaching her won't be the hard part…" Tucker said between chuckles, "It will be looking out for any tricks."
"Tucker, don't give her any ideas!" Danny said in a quiet voice.
"So far, one the few good things I can say is that she seems to be handling this okay." Sam pointed out, "Though I would definitely keep an eye on her. She could be hiding how she really feels."
"Kinda like how you guys are hiding your love for each other?" Tucker asked with a big grin and a bit of an eyebrow wiggle.
"WE ARE NOT IN LOVE!" came the chorus from the expected targets as they blushed from embarrassment.
On the other side of the room, Brina was trying to get her hand to once more to become intangible. Instead of getting that, she began to float up. It caught off guard and she barely managed to cling on the bedpost. Her lower body then was raised above her and she lost her grip as he feet touched the ceiling. She then began jumping, desperately trying to grasp the bedpost, but kept on failing.
"Uh, Danny, another thing, try to make sure she doesn't do something like that in front of your parents." Sam said as she pointed behind Danny.
Tucker then began snickering again, amused by Brina's vain attempts to get back down. When Danny turned around he saw her up there, stomping her feet as she tried to get down.
"How the hell am I supposed to get down?" Brina asked.
"I am so glad this is a long weekend…" Danny muttered before returning to the webchat, "I will talk to you guys later."
"Don't forget our movie plans." Sam said as she pulled out her ticket.
"I won't." Danny said and shut off the webchat.
Once that was done, he looked up where Brina was. And she looked frustrated as she yelled, "Don't leave me up here! Help me get down!"
She then squatted and used as much thrust as she could get to get down. This however did not get her to the bedpost. Instead, she smacked the back of head into the ceiling, making her shout, "Ouch!"
Danny smiled as he shook his head. To think this used to be one of his issues on top of losing his pants. He stood up on his bed, grabbed Brina's hand and pulled her down to the wooden floor. Once her feet touched the ground, she sighed, glad that was over.
"Thanks." Brina said simply. "Do I have to wear weights on my ankles now?"
"I tried that and it didn't work." Danny replied.
"Damn it!" Brina cursed.
Danny pondered a bit, wondering what would at least help Brina out a bit. He then remembered the Fenton Fisher and the ghost proof string it used. That would definitely help.
"I could get some of the string my parents made and tie it around your mattress." Danny suggested, "It won't stop the floating, but at least it will prevent you from going through the bed."
Brina gave a bit of a b**ch face, and said, "Wow, and I thought that I would be done with nighttime accidents when I stopped wetting the bed two years ago."
Danny cringed a bit in disgust and said, "You should probably keep that to yourself…"
Brina rolled her eyes, not seeing any problem in admitting her former issue with bedwetting. Whether it was a lack of common sense or looking for some sort of reaction, Danny was certain he didn't really want to know. Both were kinda worrisome in their own right.
"So how long do your parents even take?" Brina asked, "Picking up two prescriptions should not be taking this long."
"It really depends if my dad is trying to decide on what type of fudge to get or if they ran into a ghost," Danny replied. "It's even longer if both fudge and ghosts are involved."
Brina then stretched out her arms a bit, popping some of her loose joints before letting out a huge yawn, "In that case, I will just go off and retouch some of my photographs and play an indie RPG or two."
As Brina was about to leave with Danny squacked with more disgust and immediately shielded his eyes. She turned around and gave a weird look at him until she was directed to look at herself . She squeaked and blushed a bit.
"Actually, practice is going to be the first priority." Danny pointed out as he gagged, trying to erase the image of Brina's nudity.
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Brina followed Danny into the lab. She had what could be considered a cross between a b**ch face and a wary look. Her eyes darted around, looking for any sign of Skulker, the name of the ghost that had attacked her earlier. She wanted to avoid him at all costs, feeling that another encounter would be an absolute disaster, something she did not need when she was already nearing the edge.
"Can we go outside and do this instead?" Brina asked, her face showing a small hint of worry.
"Do you want to get caught?" Danny asked, knowing full well that Brina was definitely not ready to dodge even the most incompetent from his rogues gallery. Just as he finished that, he pulled out a small remote from a nearby drawer that had a couple of buttons.
In all honesty, Brina flat out didn't care who saw her. To her, her powers were no big deal, just another quirk that people would see. Whether they were rude about it or not did mean something to Brina, but she knew she could put them in their spots if they said the wrong thing to her face or even dared to lie about her in her presence.
'After all, I am nothing, but another person they could test their insults and teasing on,' Brina thought with a huff.
In the end, she kept that all in her head and replied with a blunt, "No". She had no interest in being chewed out at the moment.
After hearing Brina's answer, he pressed the top button, causing mechanics around the lab to active and reveal various hoops and obstacles. Needless to say, Brina was far from impressed. She made her annoyance and contempt for what was in front of her very clear.
"You want me to go through that?" Brina asked, a bit of venom coming from her lips.
Danny gave a nod.
"Damn it!" Brina cursed, making Danny wince a bit, "I hate obbys!" Brina then let out furious breath, making her loose strands of hair fly up for a brief moment. "Which form?"
Danny shot her a "what do you think" look as he pointed at the hoops on the ceiling, starting to get an idea of where this was going. Needles to say, he was not amused.
Brina looked at the hoops and grunted a bit, "If I screw up you better not take any pictures. I don't want to look like a complete dumbass."
With that, Brina began analyzing the obstacle course. Her eyes darting from the beginning and all subsequent points. She visualized how exactly one was to go through it with vivid clarity. In the end of her mental simulation, there was a little caricature of her running around in her head screaming, "HELL YEAH, I DID IT!"
"I'm all done," Brina said bluntly.
"You didn't even do anything!" Danny exasperated with disbelief.
"I visualized it all in my head." Brina countered with a slightly monotone voice.
Brina was about to leave when Danny blocked her. He looked pretty annoyed with Brina's antics. Brina made a stink face and tried to get around him, but every movement and fake movement was blocked, frustrating her to no end.
"Oh no you don't." Danny snapped, "You've actually got to do it."
"But...!" Brina protested.
"Now…" Danny pushed.
Danny and Brina locked eyes as they stared each other down. Neither had intention on catering to the other's will. It was a good solid two minutes of the battle of the wills before Brina decided to stop. She didn't like the fact she gave up, but she knew at the rate it was going right now, it was a big waste of time.
"Fine." Brina said flatly, "How am I supposed to change forms?"
"You pretty much think about it when you want to go ghost," Danny replied, wondering how to exactly put it.
The look on Brina's face was priceless. She had a combination of deer-in-headlights stare, utter disbelief, and frustration in one package. It clearly demonstrated her thought process, which she was so glad Danny, as far as she knew, could not hear word for word.
'GAAAAAH! WHAT THE FREAKING HELL IS WRONG WITH THIS UNIVERSE?!' Brina mentally shrieked with rage, 'WHY THE HELL DOES IT LIKE MAKING ME LOOK LIKE A FREAKING DUMBASS!?'
Despite this thought, Brina closed her eyes and began to do what Danny described. She searched her mind for anything that could be remotely close to what was needed. She squinched her eyes a bit, getting a bit annoyed at not finding anything as far as she knew. This was also partly due to the fact she could no longer feel the ground beneath her feet.
'That is not what I wanted! Grrrr...' Brina mentally moaned.
Feeling as if she was getting nowhere, she opened her eyes and was about to question what she was looking for exactly to see Danny smiling. Brina gave a slightly suspicious look, thinking that he was only smiling because she did the wrong thing. From what she had experienced, when someone smiles while you screw something up, it always equals something bad.
"Why are you smiling?" Brina asked a bit rudely, "I failed. I floated instead of changing forms."
"You don't need to be rude, you know," Danny pointed out, "And no, you didn't fail."
Brina cocked her head to the side a bit before looking at herself. She had actually transformed. She didn't understand why she didn't feel it happen, but that was not her biggest concern. It was the dreaded obstacle course that she was being forced to do that was her main concern.
"Can I get out of doing the obby now?" Brina asked.
"No." Danny repeated.
"Gahh!" Brina groaned as she yanked on her pigtails to the point of it hurting, getting more flustered than she was before.
'Why the HELL does the world do this to me?!"' Brina thought, 'I just want to play my games and sell my finished prints on DemonArt! Is that too much to ask for?!'
Brina turned to face the obstacle course, looking agitated. She began experimenting with using thought to help her go forward, and to her surprise she actually went forward with barely any conscious effort. It was as if it were like walking around the year or two mark of being alive. She continued to advance towards the obstacle course, wobbling very noticeably as she had yet to figure how to remain steady. Then again, steady was something she could rarely do right.
Once she was in place she began going through the course. Needless to say it was an absolute disaster. At every turn, she bumped into something, causing her to jerk back a bit and then get somehow rocketed into another part of the course. Brina tried processing everything that was going on, but that wound up getting her even more banged up. She even got smacked by a bat when she attempted to get away from a laser, which she had no idea why that was in what she assumed was a beginner's course (when in reality it was absolutely not a beginner's course).
Danny cringed as Brina got beaten at every turn by the course. He had thought since that it helped him, it would help her. By this point he was sorely mistaken. Once Brina had returned, she looked very agitated and her body was littered in cuts and bruises. As a result, she fell over onto the ground.
"Happy?" Brina groaned in annoyance and pain.
Danny sighed and deactivated the obstacle course, "At least we know what not to use."
"No dip," Brina retorted, "Is there any better way for me to learn?"
"I am not entirely sure." Danny said, helping Brina get up, "I never taught anyone how to use ghost powers before."
Brina's right eye twitched as she made yet another b**ch face, "And why did you not tell me sooner?" she then retracted that, "Oh nevermind! I don't feel like knowing right now!"
Brina stormed towards the stairs and began climbing them. While climbing, she unknowingly transformed back into her human form.
"Okay… Note to self:" Danny began, with annoyance setting in, "Don't make Brina do any obstacle courses. She will just complain and get angry."
.
As dusk began to approach, Brina found herself relaxing in front of her computer, playing Civilization IV. She had long finished retouching and submitting a quarter of her prints and felt as she deserved break from it and making sure the bank account her birth parents had set up for her received the funds from the prints that were purchased.
Brina groaned in annoyance as the Indian civilization dropped by her civilization, demanding that she convert from Christianity to Islam for the fifth time that game. That was not all, that very same civilization had also wanted her to to take on their current economic civic, State Property, which Brina did not want to use. The frustration that was triggered by the AI's demands caused Brina to experience brief bouts of invisibility and the glowing flashes her eyes did. This was made worse due to the fact she was not aware of this and her adoptive parents had just arrived home with fudge, Brina's medicine, and plenty of ectoplasmic stains on their clothes.
Brina clicked the equivalent-to-'No' option, making the Indian civilization go from cautious to annoyed. Needless to say, Brina was far from amused. She wanted the AI to stop it, and from what she could currently see, the Indian civilization had anarchy in almost every city, making the idea of catering to the AI's requests less appealing than they already were.
'You should be thankful I have not reached the Future Age, asshat,' Brina thought. 'If you request that I change my civics again, I will thump you with nukes, regardless of how many allies you have.'
Brina then turned her attention to the clock. The time was closing in on six o'clock. With a sigh, Brina saved her game and exited out of it. She stretched a bit as she spun her chair a bit, popping some of her joints.
As she began getting up, she saw a bug that sort of looked like a stink bug fly past her face, causing her to become highly disgusted. She quickly caught the bug and said, "Got you, you little asshat."
Brina felt the bug (which had an odd metallic feel to it) squirm under her grip. Due to the bug being, well, a bug, she took no time to investigate it and chucked the bug out the open window before shutting it, not caring where the bug wound up as long as she did not see it again.
Dusting her hands off, Brina picked a random CD from her suitcase and left her room. As she was running down the steps, her heel connected with the slope of the stair rather than the actual stair itself, causing her to lose balance and slide down the stairs on her backside. She yelped out of surprise as she bounced off each step with no friction to help her slow down her decent. Once she landed on the wooden floor of the living room, she felt her butt sting with pain. In front of her was the CD she had brought down, thankfully unscratched, but pretty dusty now. She picked it up and saw it was the CD that contained the entire Code: Lyoko series.
'Looks like I will have to skip around just to get to XANA Awakens Part One and Two before I can watch in production order.' Brina thought.
Suddenly, Jack and Maddie rushed from the kitchen (where they were working on dinner) and helped Brina up. Brina climbed to her feet, groaning from the pain in her rear.
"Are you okay?" Maddie asked.
"Was it a ghost?" Jack followed up.
Brina shook her head, "No ghosts were involved, just crappy motor skills, and I am alright. My heel just hit the edge of the step I was on. I have lost count how many times I fell down the stairs."
Concern did not leave either of the Fenton parents' faces, which Brina shrugged off. It was no big deal.
"Are you sure you don't need anything?" Maddie asked.
"An ice pack would be good enough…" Brina said as she sheepishly rubbed her sore butt.
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After thirty minutes of Jack and Maddie making dinner, and Brina watching the first prequel episode of Code: Lyoko (which Maddie was glad was not inappropriate) in the living room, dinner was ready. Needless to say, it was interesting. Brina got first hand experience as to what to expect at the dinner table. And that expectation was Jack trying to to use a device he called the "Fenton Ecto-Cooker", which he claimed he fixed for some reason, to speed up the cooking time of the alfredo. Brina watched in bewilderment as the next fifteen minutes were spent by Maddie and Jack chasing an ectoplasm-infused pasta monster with prototype inventions.
After that mess, it was decided that ordering pizza was a better idea. As a precaution, Maddie confiscated the Ecto-Cooker from Jack, saying she would look over it after dinner to see what was probably missed in the repairs.
Brina, having very little impulse control and almost no common sense, attempted to make a joke about the situation after hearing Danny whip up a joke that made Jazz turn a bit pink from holding back her laugh. It was so badly butchered that no one laughed; not even a little snicker. Maddie then told Brina to think before speaking, which was another thing Brina could not do.
Once everyone had finished eating, the Fenton parents went into the lab with the Ecto-Cooker in tow, being careful to make sure it did not act up on the way down to the basement/lab. Brina announced how she needed to pee and left for the nearest bathroom, holding her bladder along the way, trying to keep her bladder from leaking anything. This in turn left the kitchen almost devoid of anybody.
"So how are things going so far?" Jazz asked.
"Not as well as I was hoping…" Danny said with a small cringe, "I thought the obstacle course I use regularly would help her."
"Let me guess, she got frustrated?" Jazz asked.
Danny raised an eyebrow, "Yeah. How did you know?"
"I have watched you use it before," Jazz stated, "And I know what her beef with it is."
Jazz pulled out the book their parents brought home and opened it to a chapter that discussed various sensory problems and what they could lead to. Danny took the book and looked at it with curiosity. He saw drawings of upset eight year olds covering their ears and doing various actions that clearly showed their disdain for whatever they were being forced to face, such as loud sounds and certain textures.
"It states here various children on the spectrum have trouble processing various sensations," Jazz said and pointed to one paragraph, "It isn't just limited to what you see here in the examples; some people on the spectrum can't stand how much is going on, and that is what I am suspecting is the case with Brina. Your obstacle course, while it does help you, it is not the right tool to help Brina with her powers. She can't handle everything it is throwing at her."
"Then how am I supposed to teach her, oh great and wise Jazz?" Danny asked with some snark.
Jazz tapped her finger on her chin, "I will need to examine her and how well she deals with new experiences."
"I could always nab the Box Ghost and see if she can catch him." Danny supplied.
"And torture her with hours of 'BEWARE' and 'FEAR ME'?" Jazz asked, "Do you want to risk everyone seeing her in ghost form, having a meltdown, which is by the way worse than a tantrum?"
Danny instantly cringed, realizing how stupid that suggestion was. Yeah, he did not need to explain to everyone why he was trying to calm down a ghost who was in the middle of an outburst. He already knew Brina's freak outs were bad, he could only imagine how bad a meltdown could be.
"Okay then, what are we going to use?"
.
"Really?" Danny asked as he watch his sister set up a chessboard, "A game of chess… Are you asking for me to invite Vlad over to play with some kid he has never met?! Aren't you forgetting something? He tried to get us to kill each other!"
Jazz rolled her eyes as she placed the final piece, which was a white rook, where it belonged. She turned and faced Danny.
"Do you honestly believe I would ask you to invite him over?" Jazz asked, a bit aggravated by the assumption her brother made.
"Then who will play against her? Dad?" Danny asked, looking a bit fed up.
"Me, Danny!" Jazz pointed out.
"You play chess?"
Jazz sighed and facepalmed, "You are so clueless sometimes... The library holds monthly chess matches and the prize is a free book of your choosing. How else do you explain all of the psychology books in my room?"
Danny went beet red, "Oh… I'll go get her then... "
The teenage boy rushed up the stairs and went into Brina's room. In less than two minutes, Brina was already making a fuss, not wanting to stop what she was doing. Jazz could hear loud thumping of Brina's feet stomping around and the occasional cursing that came from her mouth. That was one thing that would definitely needed to be worked on.
Jazz looked at the ceiling and saw Danny phase through it with Brina in a headlock as she squirmed and thrashed. Danny was struggling to keep her from taking off again. Brina's eyes glowed golden yellow as she snarled.
"Let me go!"
"Couldn't have you done it without making her angry?" Jazz asked.
"I tried to, but she was way too absorbed in whatever she was doing." Danny stated as Brina managed to slip out of his grasp while blowing some air on her loose hair strands.
'Can't I ever do anything in peace?' Brina thought before asking, "Why was I dragged down here?"
Jazz walked up to Brina and handed her a small piece of of folded paper. Brina opened it and saw it was an instruction sheet for chess that included all valid moves, including Castling and En Passant, and rules.
"What the hell is with the help sheet for chess?" Brian asked.
"I just want to play a game of chess with you." Jazz stated, trying to look completely innocent, "You know, so we can get to know each other better and have a bit of bonding?"
Danny rolled his eyes, noting how unnecessary some of what Jazz said was. The "we aren't up to anything" vibe rolled off Jazz visibly. However, to Danny's surprise, Brina did not notice the subtle motive behind Jazz's words and was convinced. How this was, Danny didn't know, and he was sure he didn't want to know either.
'Okay, another note to self: Do not let anyone like Vlad get near her.' Danny thought.
"But I never played before." Brina pointed out, "I have only seen my birth parents play it on the computer."
Jazz smiled kindly, "That's why I gave you the instructions sheet. So do you want to play?"
"I guess I could…" Brina sighed, "After all, I will just keep getting bothered if I don't."
Brina sat down on the side with the black chess pieces, not wanting to start anything over who should have what color. Little to her knowledge, that was not one of Jazz's concerns at all. Same went for winning. Her goal was to assess Brina's logic to the best of her abilities. That vastly differed from Brina, who wanted to do her best to win, thinking that the game was a competition.
After the two girls were settled, pieces began jumping around the game board. Every round that flew by was quick for the most part, with a few taking a few extra seconds to plot out at least into the next turn. Danny stood off to the side, looking very bored as he watched the chess match from the side.
'I can only see Jazz and the fruitloop playing chess for fun...' Danny thought as he rest his head against the wall, 'But obviously not together...'
Jazz began to note everything she could. She noticed how Brina immediately went for a defensive barricade around her king and queen and finished it in less than ten turns. Every time one of Jazz's pieces approached it, any of the pieces that were in range and under Brina's control would come in, swipe the piece, and return to their original place in the defense by the next round.
'Judging by this defense around both her king and queen, she is afraid of being attacked,' Jazz noted. 'And with how often she retreats, she must also fear making a fatal mistake.'
As the game went on, Jazz picked up on a few times were Brina was in the perfect position to put Jazz in checkmate. Instead of Brina going for checkmate, she went for weird moves or removing powerful pieces that she deemed an immediate threat when they weren't. And during some of the even weirder moves, Jazz noticed the brunette's invisibility acting up and Brina doing her best to pay no mind to it.
'Okay definitely lots of anxiety, going to need to talk to her about it,' Jazz thought watching Brina going after yet another powerful yet pointless piece. 'She also seems to have trouble judging what is dangerous and not dangerous, I really hope that doesn't come and bite her in the butt.'
In the end, Jazz put Brina in checkmate. Brina slammed her forehead onto the table, clearly disappointed.
"I lost…" Brina muttered.
Jazz came to Brina's side and patted her on the back.
"Don't beat yourself up about it." Jazz reassured, "Everyone loses sometimes. You played very well for a first time player."
"But I hate losing…" Brina muttered some more.
"Nobody is perfect, Brina." Jazz reminded, "You just need to keep on practicing. One day, I am sure you will beat a bunch of people in chess matches. Right, Danny?"
Jazz looked up and saw Danny had left. It was safe to assume that another ghost popped up and he had to deal with it. Then again, she did notice how bored he was, so there was that too. In the latter's case, Danny never really found psychology interesting. Half the time, it annoyed him with how she used it to analyze him.
Brina got up, shivering a bit, making Jazz think that she might have a ghost sense as well. About a second later, it turned out she didn't have that power as she stretched and yawned instead of question what she felt. She was clearly sleepy. Jazz looked at the time and saw it was nearing seven o'clock at night.
"I feel tired…" Brina said as she yawned again. "I'm going to bed. Good night."
With that, Brina walked over to the DVD player, took out the CD she had put in slightly earlier. Once she dusted the underside off a bit, she climbed up the stairs quickly, wanting nothing more than to be asleep as soon as she hit her pillow.
Jazz decided it was best to pack up the chess set and put it back where she found it. Once the living room was relatively clean for the night, she went into her room to jot everything she learned from the chess match down in one of her personal psychology journals.