Warnings: Language. And Chazz developement. And some angst. And Atticus. That's right. He's on a level alllll his own.
Disclaimer: I don't own Yugioh GX
Year One: The Academic
" Chazz! Hey-Chazz! Stop for a second!"
The sound of a twig cracking underfoot. Extended strides and a quickened pace.
" Would you just wait! Chazz!"
Footsteps quickening. The sound of heavy breathing.
" Chazz, for god's sake, wait up!"
Dodging around a tree, the crunch of the forest floor under blue boots.
" Chazz! Chazz I'm trying to say sorry!"
The heavy sound of silence, panting breathes and stumbling.
" Geez, why didn't you go out for track?"
" …"
" Chazz, c'mon, don't shut me out. I'm sorry, alright? I was wrong."
" Did Jaden tell you to say that?" An accusing glance.
" Well, I…That is…" Looking away. The sound of the wind whistling in between them.
" I see."
" Hey! Don't walk away from me! Chazz! Would you just wait?!"
An abrupt turn. Fist clenching.
" Why?!" There is no answer. The drawing in of a deep breath. " Why should I listen to anything you have to say when you never listened to a single thing I ever said?! Why should I stop and let you apologize for something you're not even sorry for?!"
" That isn't fair, Chazz!"
" Neither is life! I learned that the hard way!"
" You aren't even letting me get a word in!"
" Nothing that's coming out of your mouth means anything to me Lex, because it doesn't mean anything to you either!"
" That's not true!"
" Isn't it?!"
The pain in his voice froze her movements.
Chazz slumped back against the tree, his head lowered. Under the light of the glowing moon above, his bangs cast long, dark shadows over the contours of his face, and Alexis felt a slight chill as she realized she couldn't see his eyes any longer. The defeated look of his shoulders, his whole body in fact, was completely at odds with the harsh, cold tone he used when he spoke.
" You've never given a damn about me or what I think before! You've never apologized for anything you've done to me before!" His head shot up, and Alexis was taken aback by the fury and hurt that was reflected out of Chazz's grey eyes. " So why the hell should you start regretting how you treat me now?! Huh? Why should I believe that you actually give a flying fuck about my feelings when you never have in the past!"
" Oh, like you're one to talk!" Alexis was well aware that it was hardly the time for insults and cruel words, but she had always had a volatile temper, and Chazz, as it so happened, had always been able to rub her the wrong way, no matter what he happened to be saying.
" You don't care about what I think or how I feel! All you're after is a warm body and a pair of breasts that just happen to be bigger than other girls'! I'm just a thing to you, one more object you can lord over everybody else!" She narrowed her eyes at him, too angry to take in the shocked look on his face and the way his mouth hung slack from his jaw. " I know your game, Princeton, and there's no way in hell that I'm going to play it!"
She stormed past him, roughly pushing him to side even though he moved out of her way. The wind howled around them, and the moon was covered by a passing cloud, throwing the whole world, for a split second, into darkness. A shiver of fear erupted down her spine, but Alexis held it in and kept going.
Chazz's hand curled around hers arm, trying to pull her back, but she shook it off almost violently, stalking deeper into the forest.
" Alexis!" Chazz shouted after her, but she picked up her pace, trying to put as much distance between the two of them as she could. " Alexis, it's dangerous in there!"
" Go fuck yourself, Chazz!" She screamed back, and started to run.
She never noticed the shady figure following after her in between the trees.
" It's not…" Chazz muttered to the soft breeze as he lay on the roof. The sun was shining brightly and the overall heat of the day, coupled with the wonderful wind and the relaxing smell of the ocean at his front, was making everyone, even the grumpy and antisocial Chazz, feel like doing nothing more than lazing about for the entirety of the day. (He knew for a fact that Jaden was sleeping on the roof of the Red Dorm, Syrus and Chumley were staring out at the ocean by the cliff, and Lia, whom he had seen on and off again from his position at the top if the school all day, was meandering around the island, snapping pictures and kicking rocks into the water to see the ripples. Chazz tried very hard not to think about the younger girl, because it brought back strange and painful memories.)
" It only hurts when Jaden duels."
Chazz shook his head, his bangs smacking him in the face.
" That…was just too weird." He rolled his eyes. " Like it hasn't been a weird few days already."
" Yeah boss!" The voice to his left made him cringe. He ignored the way Ojama Yellow was bouncing around, cooing at him. " You've really have a rough time all around, haven't you?"
" Shut up and buzz off." The boy in black snapped. " I don't have time to deal with you idiots today."
" But Boss," Ojama Green protested, " we just wanted to make you feel better! You've been all grouchy and stressed out since ya got back!"
" Yeah, you haven't slept well in ages!" Ojama Black butted in. Chazz grit his teeth.
" Well, excuse me for not being able to handle being trapped in a large bubble by some freak for about twelve hours like a pro!"
" That's not what we meant boss!"
" Yeah. We were just worried about you!"
" Don't be mad, Chazz! We just wanna help!"
" You want to help?" Chazz snarled, rounding on the three floating spirits. Ojama Black and Green, still relatively new to his deck and still relatively frightened by his temper, squeaked in fear and ducked behind the braver and more hazed Ojama Yellow, who remained firmly planted where he was.
" Boss, all we've ever wanted to do was help you." The little spirit pleaded. His brothers popped their head up from behind his shoulders.
" That's right!"
" All we want is for you to be happy!"
" Then leave me alone!" Chazz made to swipe at them, but Ojama Yellow darted out of the way, dodging the hand with a growing confidence born of having to make similar moves on almost an hourly basis. " Go on, scram!"
" No way, Boss!" Yellow insisted. " You found us and took us when nobody else would. We're your monsters now, and we're gonna stick by your side no matter what!"
" Just leave me alone!" Chazz shouted. " Why can't you understand that I want to be alone right now?!"
" She didn't mean it like that, Boss." Yellow ventured bravely. " She was just upset, and scared. She didn't mean any of i-"
" Shut up!" Chazz's voice was hoarse, and there was something besides anger in his tone that caused Ojama Yellow to, for once, freeze in his movements and allow Chazz to smack him (temporarily) out of existence. His brothers, sensing his thought pattern, allowed themselves to be whacked as well, looking up at Chazz with remorseful eyes.
" When you're ready to talk boss," Green began.
" …You won't have to look far to find an ear." Black finished as he vanished in a puff of smoke.
Scowling at the last place he had seen the trio (he could no longer think of them as truly separate entities. Yes, they each had their own voices and their own specific little mannerisms, but the Ojama brothers were, for all intents and purposes, one and the same creature, useless and lazy, and loyal to him even though Chazz could find no qualities in him that should inspire such love.) Chazz, huffed, and wondered what he had done that was cruel and awful enough to have him end up with such a group of annoyances.
He flinched as the word crossed his thoughts.
' It isn't fair.' He thought, and then winced as he realized how childish and utterly stupid the thought sounded. It was something the old Chazz, the cruel, angry Chazz (the Chazz from Obelisk Blue, the Chazz who squeezed Jaden's throat that night at the Abandoned Dorm; he still shuddered with he thought about it, because even after so many months, even after so many nights lying awake and thinking about that awful moment when he saw the infectious light in Jaden's eyes dim just the slightest bit, Chazz still couldn't honestly say that he would've stopped. Anger and hatred did strange things to a person, and while Chazz swore he was never going to lay a finger on Jaden again – outside of the occasional rough-housing that he had mentally deemed permissible -, he couldn't shake the feeling that somewhere in all that talk, there was a very real, very dangerous lie) would've said, once upon a time. But that story had already had its end (a bunch of slackers telling his brothers to stuff it – if that wasn't the highlight of the century, he didn't know what was), and Chazz wasn't eager to play the role of the Dark Prince anymore, when it came down to it. The damage it had wrecked on his mental and physical states as well as the feeling of calm mellowing out had granted him made him wary of any antagonistic roles.
' But still,' he thought with a bit of a pout (not that he'd ever admit that it was a pout. He still had his pride to think of), ' it really isn't fair. I mean…even after everything…'
No one was allowed to say that he hadn't been affected by what had happened to Syrus. It had hurt, damnit, a great deal more than he had ever expected it to. Losing Syrus had hurt, and Chazz had been stunned to find out just how far he was willing to go to get the midget back.
' Even after all that...after everything I did…everything I went through…she still…'
" I know your game, Princeton, and there's no way in Hell that I'm going to play it!"
" It's not a game!" Chazz hissed to himself, burying his fingers into his black hair. " It was never a game! Why can't she see that?! How can I…" He slumped back against the roof. " How can I get her to take me seriously?"
" Sounds like you, my friend, need a little help from the master!"
Chazz let out the most undignified yelp he'd ever allowed to slip past his lips, shot up like a rocket, and half twisted to discover the source of the noise. Unfortunately for Chazz, the twist caused his weight be shifted and his center of gravity went with it, far too quickly for him to recover. He went tumbling over his own two feet, flipping a perfect three hundred and sixty degrees and landed, with nothing to cushion him, with his chin smashing into the concrete of the rooftop. From above him, as he grimaced, there came a whistle.
" Not bad on the take off, but the landing could use a little work. Full points for the circle, but you lost some style points. Full comedy points though, if it's any conciliation. All in all, an 8.5 out of a possible ten."
Chazz groaned, and looked up until he met the grinning face and playful eyes of Atticus Rhodes.
" Did you always take great joy in my pain, or did your time as Nightshroud make you more sadistic?"
Atticus put on a mocking look of pain on his face.
" That hurt, Chazzy-"
" Don't call me Chazzy." Chazz muttered as he sat up, rubbing his aching and scrapped chin.
" – and after I came all this way to help you out." Atticus finished triumphantly. Chazz eyed him.
" You want to help me get your sister to take me seriously?"
Something like that." Atticus waved his hand dismissively. " Anyway, the first stage of romance is always getting the attention of your intended target."
" Atticus, hang on a second-"
" Now, you're in luck, because I happen to have the perfect plan."
" Atticus, would you just listen for a second?"
" It's a little risky, sure, but then again, isn't everything in the game of love?"
" It's not a game!" Chazz yelled, his fists clenched at his sides as he finally managed to get a word in while Atticus droned on. The older boy, interrupted from his scheming, paused for a second, taking in Chazz's flushed face, white knuckles, and gritted teeth. Abruptly, his handsome face broke into a bright smile that, instead of calming Chazz (who had been more than a little worried about what Atticus was going to do to him – if there was one thing Atticus Rhodes hated, it was being interrupted when he was in the middle of one of his speeches, a trait Chazz realized he actually shared with a certain foul tempered Academic) down, made him only more nervous.
" That is exactly," Atticus clapped Chazz on the shoulder, " what I wanted to hear."
**_**
All things considered, Syrus supposed that everything could've gone much worse. There could have been an earthquake, or a tsunami, or the volcano behind the school (who put a school full of easily panicked teenagers directly in front of an obviously active volcano?! Sometimes, Syrus really had to wonder at Mr. Kaiba's logic. But then, Mr. Kaiba was a genius, so Syrus supposed that what went through the man's head was probably beyond anything he or any of his friends could comprehend) could've erupted and buried them all under a scorching layer of molten rock.
So really, it wasn't nearly as bad as it could've been.
Yes, Syrus acknowledged with a wince, that bump on Chazz's head was probably coming to bruise something awful, but it was completely his own fault. Lia, with her furious war cry, had given him plenty of warning, and less time to get out of the way, but it had been sufficient time. If Chazz hadn't had the foresight to see that the Academic was going to be pissed at him for one reason or another (Syrus didn't actually know why Lia was so upset with Chazz – she had degenerated down into incoherent French after about three seconds in his presence – but seeing as how Lia spent about 95% of her time with Chazz being furious with him, he didn't poke his head in too deep – for fear Lia might try to knock it off his shoulders), then he deserved that clonk on the head.
It was, when Syrus ran the scene over in his head later, a rather funny scene. Or, at least it had been, what with all of them debating on how best to take Chazz down without doing too much damage (because really, he was acting on Atticus' orders, something Alexis said meant that the former Obelisk wasn't quite as much to blame for his actions). Zane, surprising both his brother and most of the surrounding gang, had suggested simply tackling the former Obelisk. Jaden had agreed, and Syrus was just gearing up to be ready for the attack when a very familiar voice, filled with a very familiar fury had risen up from behind him.
" Chazz. Princeton." Lia hadn't looked so much as angry as she did capable of commiting varies degrees of murder. " Do you know what I am about to do to you?"
" Buzz off, bitch, I'm on a mission here." Chazz had waved her off like an errant child, turned up in the wrong place. Lia's face had gone from boiling red to shocked white and then enraged purple so fast Syrus swore his eyes had gotten whiplash from the speed of the changing colours.
" Wrong. Answer. Princeton." Was all Lia had said before she's shrieked something incomprehensible in French (but from the slack-jawed look of half horror and half awe Alexis had been giving her, Syrus had assumed it was something only fit for ill-tempered, drunken company), and had whipped out a rather large, very heavy looking book from nowhere (by this point in time, Syrus had learned that questioning the methods and means that Lia – or any other enraged female, for that matter – used to store and access her weapons of choice was a very, very bad idea), and had proceed to send the book digging into Chazz pale forehead.
And then Atticus had tried to intervene.
" Whoa, whoa, cool your jets, Kitten." He'd held his hands up in a form of surrender and offered Lia his most winning smile. Syrus had noticed that the fact that Lia was giving him a glare with enough force to impale a more observant man went completely over the older boy's head.
" I get that you've got some issues to settle with Chazzy over here," he'd stuck his thumb at the swirly-eyed Chazz, on whose forehead still rested the overweight textbook, " but you've gotta slow down and see the situation for what it is."
Lia'd twitched. Syrus had winced and wondered at Atticus' chances.
" This is love." Atticus had said reverently, causally throwing an arm around Lia's shoulders and hauling her against his side, nodding sagely and taking up a thinking pose. Lia had gone very still, staring at the hand resting on her left shoulder like it could jump up and bite her.
" That's right." Atticus nodded again, smiling happily. " This right here isn't just any old duel goin' on. Chazzy here's on a mission for the sake of true love, so you'll have to understand why you can't beat the shit outta him right now, okay?"
He'd given her a bright grin.
" Can you do that for me, Kitten?
Beside him, Syrus had distinctly seen Jaden mouthing ' Three…two…one…', and Alexis smacking her facing into her palm at her brother's attitude.
There'd been a beat of silence, in which Lia had stared at Atticus and his winning smile with the air of a person who'd been told by a psychopath that they'd be the first to die. Atticus had simply kept on smiling, clearly not seeing the look and deciding to take Lia's silence as stunned agreement (stunned by his good looks and immense charisma, Alexis later explained. Jaden snorted and Zane rubbed his temples upon hearing that, muttering something about things never really changing). He'd given her shoulders an encouraging squeeze.
And had promptly ended up on his knees, a look on intense pain on his features and his arms around his middle, carefully rubbing the spot Lia had viciously jabbed with her admittedly bone elbow.
" Me touche autre fois, et je te briserai." She'd snarled with all the terrifying fierceness of a cornered, enraged Bengal tiger. Atticus had made some pained grunting noise that Lia had sniffed at, before she'd stalked off after the now conscious Chazz, who was rubbing his red forehead and swearing up a storm.
" What the fuck was that for?!" He'd hissed at Lia's approaching form. " Jesus fucking Christ, what is your problem?!"
" You. Knocked me. The fuck. Out." Lia'd growled, and made to hit him again. Then she'd gone very still, turned quickly to look at Atticus, and allowed her face to go even darker with fury.
" Just who the fuck are you calling Kitten?!"
And that, Syrus supposed, was how they'd been led to where they were. He cast a cautious eye on Jaden who was restraining Lia with a causal air, occasionally making comments about the duel and acting as though her flailing, twisting body had no effect on him.
" Well that's an interesting move." He let out a low whistle as Blade Skater vanished it a shower of sparks, her attack points dropping rapidly from both duelists' life points.
" It doesn't matter if we both get hit." Chazz snapped at Alexis. " I'm willing to take the pain." He looked at her fervently. " I'm willing to take it."
" Chazz, just shut up." Alexis rolled her eyes, flicking them down to her deck. In doing so, she completely missed the look of pain that flashed through Chazz's eyes.
" Lexi, don't shoot him down like that!" Atticus implored, gripping his ukulele. " At least try to feel the love."
" The only thing either of you is about to feel is by foot breaking your noses!" The irritated blonde snapped. Atticus fairly withered under her gaze.
" That's cold, Lexi. After everything I'd been through, I thought my baby sister would be more sympathetic to-"
" I'll solve this for everyone!" Lia screamed, shoving valiantly at the arm Jaden had loosely locked around her waist. It didn't give. " Just let me kill him!"
" Who? Atticus or Chazz?" Alexis sighed over her shoulder.
" Does it even matter at this point?"
" Tell you what, you get Chazz, I'll get Atticus, then we can blame it on some stuck up Obelisk and go start a business in Portugal."
" Make it Spain and we got a deal."
" How about Belgium? It'll be the last place they look for us."
" Yeah…I can see that working."
Hey!" Chazz's voice cut through their playful banter. Alexis turned to look at her opponent, fully prepared to chew him out for interrupting the most fun she'd had all day long, but found her angry words sticking to the back of her throat as she took in Chazz.
He was standing rigidly across from her, his fists clenched at his sides, his face all but hidden in the shadow of his long, dark bangs. From what little she could see, he had his lower lip between his teeth, and was worrying it in a very Lia-like fashion. The fists at his side were white-knuckled, and, if she focused in hard and squinted a little, she could see it trembling against the dirt speckled black of his trench coat. There was something under his usual bravado, something under the harsh tone and angry barbs and wicked snarls, something broken and cold that made Alexis stop. Chazz refused to look at her, his eyes, from what she could tell, gazing off into the far distant horizon. But the fragile, desperate edge to his voice stopped her anger and annoyance dead in their tracks.
" For once...just for once..." Chazz shuddered, almost invisibly, and behind him, Atticus' cheerful, if somewhat forced, grin faded away into a blank, cold face.
" Look at me!" Chazz whipped his head up to stare into her eyes. " Look at me, Lexi! For god sakes, just look at me! You don't have to love me, hell, you don't even have to like me, so long as you look at me!"
The dam that had broken in the restroom before his duel with Jaden and the bubbling hurt that had been reflected in his eyes the night of Banner's apparent betrayal (what had happened that night? All Alexis knew was that Jaden's face had been pale and haggard, and he'd gripped a book of alchemy in his hands like it was the last link to his sanity. Lia was shaken and Chazz had been brooding silently, but his actions towards Lia, while still as hostile and cruel as ever, were tinged with a strange sense of understanding.) came rushing out in a terrified garble of words. Alexis stood, stunned and ashamed that she was stunned (Chazz was human, just the same as everybody else. He was human and he had a heart and had she really gone out of her way to put him down and hurt him? Was she really any different from the arrogant Blues, who strutted around in their navy coats and their unearned pride, that she hated so much), as the tidal wave of words spilled out.
" Just look at me! Look at me and see me! That's all I'm asking! All I want is for you to see me!" Chazz's face was flushed and his eyes were overbright. Alexis had the oddest sensation of shame, as though it was terribly wrong for this outburst to come when Chazz was in full public view. Behind her, although she couldn't actually see it, she felt the awkward tension press into the others. Syrus looked away, Chumley stared at his shoes as if they were the most interesting thing on the beach, and Zane coughed awkwardly, looking out at the sea. Lia stared openly at Chazz for a moment, taking in his glittering eyes and clenched fists and remembered the long ago night before Bastian's duel, and fell slack against Jaden's arms, her bangs covering her eyes. Jaden alone continued to look at Chazz, his face blank but open. There was no awkwardness in the way he carefully turned Lia away from the older boy, and no hint of fear as he looked at Chazz's face. The older boy flicked his eyes away from Alexis' for an instant. His own gray pupils connected with the soft brown of Jaden's, and the younger boy gave one solitary, encouraging nod.
" My whole life..." Chazz began softly, "...my whole life, no one's ever looked at me. I've never...I didn't have friends. Not real ones. Not the kind who liked me for me. I was a Princeton. I was a Princeton before I was me, and I hated it." He shook his head, his bangs trembling. " I hated it! I hated being just one more variable in Slade and Jagger's plan! I hated being their puppet! I hated having to do everything, every little fucking thing, according to their plan! Do you have any idea what that's like?!" Chazz spat at her, and Alexis stepped back at the intensity of his gaze. " Do you know what it feels like, to be told how to do every single thing? To not have a choice in anything? To live your whole goddamn life according to someone else's plan?!" Chazz was shouting again, but the first tears had finally gathered in the corners of his eyes, and it somehow humanized him. Alexis looked at him, at the pain in his glimmer eyes, and wondered why she'd never looked in them before.
" It's suffocating! Every breath felt like I was taking it through a choke hold! Every...every...it was wrong, okay?! Everything felt wrong! I didn't even know who I was! I wasn't anybody! I was a checkpoint, a method, and that's it! I was a way for my brothers to get what they wanted, and I wasn't anything more than that! And I couldn't...there wasn't any way to get out. Slade and Jagger...they're...they're my brothers. It's not worth much, but it's all I had. They were my brothers. Even when yelled at me, even when they told me how worthless I was, they were still my brothers. Even when they..." His fingers reached up and gently stroked the skin of his cheek, wincing as though it caused him pain. Behind her, Alexis heard Jaden suck in his breath. " They're my brothers. They still are, but...now it's...things are...it's different now." Chazz shook his head. " I'm different. Everything's...I don't have be their pawn anymore. Every step I take...it's not for Slade or Jagger anymore. I can...I can walk for myself. I can make my own path." His fingers closed around the deck resting in the duel disk. " I can finally...duel for myself now. It's not about what Slade and Jagger want from me anymore. It's about me. It's about what I want."
And then he was looking at her, with feverishly bright eyes, and there was something pleading, something broken, and something hopeful in them that stole Alexis' breath away.
" And I want you."
There was a beat of silence. Alexis reached her hand up, unaware that it was trembling violently, and pressed it to her suddenly racing heart. Behind her, his eyes still fixed on Chazz, Jaden smirked softly, squeezing Lia's shoulders. The girl in his arms slumped deeper into his embrace, her head turned away and her eyes glimmering under the curtain of her bangs. Syrus, shivering and unable to look at Chazz any longer (there was too much in those eyes. Too much what, Syrus wasn't sure. Maybe too much pain, or maybe too much fear, or anger. Or maybe, some half forgotten, deeply buried part of him whispered softly, there was too much hope) took a deep breath, and nearly choked as the tension in the air seemed to seep into his throat, clogging it and making him gag.
And as Syrus struggled for air, Lia raised her head and looked over Chazz's head, staring at the wispy ring of smoke that floated over the school from the volcano.
" Will..." Her voice was small, and for the first time, submissive. " Will it...be alright?"
" Of course." Jaden answered in a strange voice. It was somehow deeper, cockier, and all together too grown and old for it to sound right coming out of the mouth of a light-hearted goof like Jaden. If Syrus hadn't been so busy trying to adjust to the stressed atmosphere of the situation, he might have taken note of it, and that sound, the tone Jaden's voice took in that split second, would've stayed with him.
" I'm here, aren't I?"
And as those words, unheard to any but the trembling girl he held, slithered out of his mouth like serpents, the world beneath their feet tilted and shook with a might roar.
Hey everyone. This will be the last chapter for this part of today. After this, I'm going to bed, and will post again after I wake up. See you around noon-ish! I'm just kidding. ...More like two in the afternoon. Maybe three. Four definitely...maybefive.
Anywho, here we have the 'Chazzanova' episode, revamped and angstified for your viewing pleasure. I hope you enjoyed it. And Lia beating on Chazz. And Atticus...being Atticus. AND SURVIVING Lia's rage. He should get a plaque for that.
See you later today!
MoS
