SlippingSanity: I am so sorry that this is so late and short and not how I promised it to be. I'll fix that mistake next chapter, Burakku's Shadow, I promise!

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh GX, nor do I own any of its characters. I am only borrowing them for this plot, and make no money from this. Yugioh Gx belongs to Kazuki Takahashi and to the many others that contributed to the GX creation. I take no credit; I am simply borrowing the characters for the plotline.

Chapter Ten

Scarlet Rings: Resolve

Resolve: 1) To make a firm decision. 2) A decision or resolution.

It was white all around. Unlike the darkness, it was bright and he could see the smooth never-ending surface stretched out before him. It was a bearable cold that brought a small shiver out of his body, rather than the frigid winds that froze his body into ice. Something made light whooshing noises off to his right, and he noted that, unlike the darkness, light allowed full usage of at least three out of five senses. He felt too tired to speak, and there was certainly nothing he felt like putting the sense of taste to test.

Chazz floated on the comfort staring into the light around him and frowned with the whispers from deep within his mind that said that the light is just like the darkness. It was the same, only with more privileges and more freedoms. There was still nothingness, and there was still loneliness.

He fumbled with the idea of loneliness for a few seconds before he was distracted by a dull ache in his chest area.

There were bandages wrapped around his torso, he realized as he took in a sharp breath. Secure to the point of suffocation, he noted dully. Even still, that was far from the cause of his discomfort as he continued to breathe silently but heavily. What felt like a large bruise near or even above his heart throbbed painfully, almost as if the blow had been done recently.

Chazz frowned at the pain, slowly raising his hand to the pulsing pain. Even the light graze over the securing fabric caused coils of pain to slither throughout almost every nerve in his body, and he immediately slid his arm down to his side.

Could he really hurt in death? Was he really dead?

Dark eyes scanned one side of his surroundings. Clutters of papers, clothes, and other objects and furniture he knew so well instantly quelled his thoughts.

He was not dead at all. He was just in his bedroom staring at his ceiling.

"Right," Chazz scoffed at himself. Like he'd really die so easily from something he could barely remember.

"Chazz?" A familiar voice reached his ears, and he scoffed again. His appointed tutor was here in his room, and apparently had taken it upon himself to play caretaker.

Idiot. Loser. Chazz berated Bastion as he glared at the ceiling one second longer.

Chazz turned in his bed to look at Bastion, ignoring the pain the movement brought upon him. His eyes narrowed in anger and disgust as he watched the fabric of Bastion's clothing sporting the red color of blood like a flag. The color was splashed on almost every article of Bastion's clothing; even the yellow jacket appeared to have been a sort of weird tie-dye fabric.

Chazz glared at Bastion's clothing a while longer with grit teeth. A low growl made its presence known while Chazz clenched his hands into tight fists. What was Bastion doing still wearing those soiled things? Why had he still worn that testament to Chazz's insanity and remained blind to the awful things that ran through Chazz's mind and body because of it?

"You're awake?" Bastion neared the edge of Chazz's bed quickly. His concern quickly changed into one of puzzlement as Chazz grabbed hold of his red and yellow blazer.

"Take this off," Chazz glared into Bastion's dark eyes as he fisted the long sleeved blazer. His teeth grit tighter as he felt the now cold liquid roll between his fingers and down his forearm before dripping off at the elbow, refusing to let himself acknowledge the twisted feeling of self disgust the blood rung from Bastion's jacket rose. "Now."

Bastion said nothing as he dropped his gaze from Chazz's almost desperate glare to the hands fisting his school color-coordinated jacket. Small pale fist clenched angrily at his stained clothing, pulling in almost the entire large odd splat of blood as if to hide it away from anyone who may have seen it; away from Chazz himself. Bastion noticed the small trembles in Chazz's arms that came from the grip on his jacket, and saw the goosebumps rise from the cold air hitting the thin lines of blood on Chazz's skin.

"What did I say?" Chazz demanded Bastion's eyes back to his for a second. "Take it off!" Chazz's fingers shook as he fumbled to take the stained fabric off of Bastion's person. He had to take off his own blazer and jackets before, knew the all too easy routine of such a task, but couldn't seem to find any method to remove Bastion's.

A growl found its way past Chazz's throat as he grew more and more frustrated. Why was it so hard to remove the blazer?! If only his fingers didn't shake so much…

"Chazz," Bastion caught the addressed teen's wrist with his hands and held them steady. "I would appreciate it if you did not."

Those words held in the air like a balloon filled with helium and for a brief moment the expression in Chazz's eyes left Bastion to believe that the balloon and been carried away into the sky above. The confused and surprised look continued to dance around like sparks in Chazz's eyes as Bastion stared down at the shorter male with a calm expression.

Chazz continued to fist Bastion's jacket as he sat on his bed, he continued to repeat Bastion's words and he felt the drops of blood coil over his cold skin and drip into the small dark circle beginning to form on his covers. No matter how hard he tried, it seemed as though he couldn't get a reign in on his emotions and he tore his eyes away from Bastion's before he could further disgrace himself. The wall held his gaze as if it had all the answers to all of Chazz's unspoken and unthought-of questions.

Silence stilled the room, and Chazz continued to listen to the unmoving lips of the mute wall. He watched with unfocused eyes as some sort of dull anticipation for a projector of his life to roll on the creamy white surface and sort everything out. Maybe it could even show him why he was experiencing odd phenomenon that no one in his family had experienced, tell him why so much blood seemed to rain down and cake on his skin, and even explain to him why it felt so good, comforting even, to sit in the silence and clench Bastion close to his seated body.

Chazz barely noticed as Bastion wrapped his fingers around Chazz's wrists and pull his hands away. He noticed as immediate as his mind dragged itself away from the wall that his hands were unbidden reaching out for Bastion. He could feel every twitch in his digits and every struggling extend his muscles made for the taller teen.

He snatched his arms free, cursing himself for his unexplainable want and desire, and crossed the betraying appendages over his chest.

"Why…" Chazz whispered sharply into the silence and grit his teeth after the word left his mouth with a bitter taste. There was nothing to say after that one word, or at least none that came immediately to mind. The one word that held itself up so brightly in the dark uncomfortable silence could have been easily finished with any number of the raging questions demanding answers in his head, but none of them dared to reach his lips. It felt to him as if he knew the answers to the questions, but refused to ask for fear of a new, unwanted answer.

"Why?" Bastion repeated in his soft baritone voice, and Chazz didn't know whether he wanted to know or wanted the other teen to shut his mouth. "It's because this is as close as I'll let myself get to you," Bastion's words were almost a whisper as they came to a finish.

"What are you talking about?" Chazz asked with as much forcefulness as he could summon to coat the confusion he wasn't positive his body would let him hide.

Chazz couldn't understand it. He could easily bluff or block out anything he didn't want to convey to the public outside of his thoughts. Emotions never ran further than the chained leash he kept tight around them, his mouth never ran laps without his body, and his body never made unconscious decisions on its own. Chazz was as predictable as he let himself be, and that was that. If he wanted to smile, he'd do it on his own. If he wanted to talk, he moved the alphabet into words. His control was what made him so distant and so different and so powerful, but his control over himself shattered like stricken glass when Bastion was near.

No, he could never deceive Bastion, and the thought alone terrified him more than he would ever let himself believe.

"That wound on your chest, Chazz," Bastion's explanation sounded oddly like the rehearsed script of an acting doctor and for a brief moment Chazz wanted to look around his room for cameras. "I did it to you."

Chazz frowned as Bastion as he stared at the taller teen looking down at him waiting for his response.

"What?!" Chazz glared into Bastion's eyes to convey his total seriousness on the matter. "What the hell is wrong with you?!"

Bastion winced from the volume of the enraged accusation, and Chazz winced from the pain in his chest, but still their eyes never left one another's. Bastion met Chazz's fire with eyes so calm it almost passed for condescending, and the threatening sparks of electric dark energy silently told the other that he was not in the business of feeling small.

Bastion cleared his throat before continuing.

"I was just…" He stared up at the ceiling as if to collect his thoughts. His mouth moved as he stared above his head, and Chazz could catch the whispered mathematical equations Bastion chanted rhythmically. For a second he was lost in that voice, but only for a second.

"You were just…" Chazz was determined to receive and answer for marring his flesh with a painful and, from what he could guess, ugly wound.

"This," Bastion now looked into Chazz's eyes. He raised a hand over his chest briefly before lowering it to the blazer. Slowly, almost unbearably slow, Bastion removed the yellow jacket and his green cotton shirt beneath and exposed not only his fit form (Chazz couldn't help but to notice), but a large cotton-filled patched with medical tape running horizontally over it to keep the patch over the wound more than likely there. "This is as close as I am able to be with you."

What the… What is he talking about? Chazz thought as his eyes widened with the possible meanings to Bastion's words.

"What…" Chazz exhaled long and low, as if he were stricken physically in the chest.

"I don't want what you want," Bastion stared at the patch covering his left bicep. He touched it lightly and looked over at Chazz, continuing his explanations even though Chazz was giving him a confused look that begged for answers. "I don't want to be like I was with you, not anymore."

"What are you talking about?!" Chazz swung his feet over the edge of the bed, but did nothing more as the wound began to hurt. "Stop trying to sound so… so much like…" Chazz growled and let his eyes slip away into those emotions he couldn't seem to handle anymore. "You weren't anything more to me than some stranger forced upon me to teach me math! You do not have—"

"I will still give you math lessons, Chazz," Bastion resumed calmly, but his tone had dropped a bit with annoyance and the angry look he gave Chazz as he stared the other down his nose showed his displeasure at being interrupted, "but I will not precipitate those rather odd, deluded, unwelcome, and disturbing fantasies you impose on me."

Chazz's eyes widened considerably. The contents of his stomach churned dangerously and his mouth felt sour. If Bastion continued his rant, he was going to vomit.

"What the hell are you talking about?!" Chazz snarled his defense, his eyes a mix of pure anger and confusion. "Imposing on you? Why would I even do that? One: I don't even know you. The only thing that put you in my life right now is the fact that you have to tutor me; otherwise you wouldn't have crossed my mind as anything other than an insignificant waste of space! Two: I don't like you. Period."

"You don't like me?" Bastion's question held no sort of surprise or disappointment, but rather like he was trying to repeat Chazz's words as though they were a foreign tongue. He kept his eyes locked with Chazz even as he took a step towards the bed.

"No, I don't," Chazz replied honestly with narrowed eyes and more spoken force than was needed. "Since the day you approached me and Jaden on the roof, my life has been nothing short of hell. You've ruined anything even remotely close to good that has happened in my life, and now you're accusing me of hitting on you?" Chazz scoffed at the sheer stupidity of the accusation before fixing Bastion with a glare that froze even the air they breathed. "Eat shit and die, you fucker."

Bastion stared, eyes wide, at Chazz face. The glare in his eyes and the threatening smirk on his face was challenging Bastion, and he could feel it. There was something begging, demanding that Bastion says something other than what Chazz had laid law. At the moment, from the look he was giving, Bastion swore that Chazz could argue that the world was a pyramid rather than a sphere.

Nonetheless, Bastion blinked and continued.

"You really don't understand, do you?" Bastion's heavy accent whispered in the stifling silence, his lips tracing every letter of his words in the shadows cast by the sun setting outside the window.

The shadows covered his eyes from Chazz's sight, and his expression was slowly devoured by the darkness. His stiff form and his tone of voice put Chazz on edge slightly. They were so low and precise. They were so… so even that they left even himself without objection, and Chazz mentally praised himself for whatever control he had remaining over his glare and his smirk. He may not have had any strong comebacks at the moment, but he would be damned if he would appear weak anymore before Bastion.

"What don't I understand, oh knowledgeable one?" Chazz mocked. A bluff, he knew, but he refused to back down or look a clueless fool. He had known one, and the emptiness in that one's head was enough for the both of them.

Jaden sneezed loudly and animatedly as he walked down the moonlit sidewalk. His teeth chattered as he struggled to gain more heat from his red jacket than was possible.

"Y-you can have m-my jacket if you need it," Syrus looked up at Jaden, but only for a second before he resumed looking down at the cracks in the sidewalk.

Jaden exhaled softly. Syrus had been watching the ground counting the cracks and memorizing their odd angles ever since he had woken up.

"No," Jaden shook his head, "besides, look at you! At least I'm not the stuttering!" Jaden joked slightly, his laughter lowering unnoticeable at the half-hearted laughter coming from Syrus.

Syrus said nothing more as he looked down at the passing gray beneath his red sneakers. Jaden could have taken his jacket, and he wouldn't have been cold. His voice shook with suppressed sobs and his skin; well he could have been cut repeatedly and not have felt a drop of pain. Even though he was awake, it felt almost unreal. Every step he took raised him higher and higher towards the sun. If only he could stop his wings from flapping and land inside of his body…

"Sy, are you alright?"

I'm fine. Syrus thought as he smiled. Really, I am. Please ignore the fact that I stopped walking and that my legs won't move. Take my hand, please, and walk me home. Ignore the shaking of my body. It doesn't matter, I'm just cold. Pay no attention to the tears falling from my eyes and the rambling from my mouth. And Jaden, please don't be worried about my eyes closing in a faint. I'm just sleepy… very, very sleepy…

"Sy!" Jaden cried out as he caught Syrus's unconscious body.

"Well?" Chazz demanded the smirk still on his lips even though his patients were wearing thin. "What don't I know?"

"I'm surprised," Bastion shook his head. "I thought you understood already. I've seen you suffering from them, Chazz. The nightmares and the lost expression on your face from every moment you can't explain your actions."

The smirk dissolved into a frown as Chazz continued to listen to Bastion.

"I know what's been going on, but only because of I feel the same thing," Bastion held his arm out to Chazz.

Even in the darkness, even without the light from the moon or even the glitters from the millions of stars in the sky, Chazz was able to see it. He couldn't believe his eyes, and pulled Bastion closer to him, their bodies almost uncomfortably close, as he turned Bastion's arm at angles that would make it seem as though Bastion's arm was disconnected at any joint.

It glowed in the shadows, providing its own eerie dull light that bore striking haunting shadows against its color. It flushed against Chazz's face and sent waves of comfortable heat through his body.

There against Bastion's skin, in the form of a thick line that held no ending nor a beginning, was crimson.