Concept: Honda and Jou, friendship based. And it seems like it's going somewhere, but at the moment the plot is on hold in favor of a few other ideas I'm toying with, so it may be a while before I get around to trying to add anotherchapter or part. .

Rating:PG

Standard disclaimer: No, I don't own it, it didn't happen...it's kinda pointless to sue me because I own very little besides some rats.

The words were black and white on the paper, they glared back at him as though mocking with more of a bite than normal school assignments. This one hit a raw nerve, nipped a bit too deep to make him comfortable.

'Does how a person is raised directly determine who they become?'

There was something to the statement, Jou mused to himself while he toyed with his pen, that a person was only waiting to become a mirror of what came before. He had seen proof of it every so often in the little things his friends did, tiny glimpses of that odd truth that sometimes caught him off guard. No one was immune as far as he could tell, though he would have given a lot to be able to convince himself otherwise. It was a puzzle worthy of some magic in itself, how things like that came to pass.

He though that if he could work out how the pieces fit together and push the parts into place perhaps there was a means to avoid such a fate hidden in the corners of that solution. But the doubt was clear enough to discourage him, to make him think there was such a thing as fate.

The idea stayed with him long after the final class bell had rung for the day, it lingered far into the dusty shadows of early evening as he walked home in silence. Or at least near silence because it was impossible to stay utterly soundless when in the company of a certain brunette who had taken to following him like a shadow. Though to be fair Honda followed Jou only as much as Jou shadowed him, one of the benefits of the comfort of long-standing friendship was to be able to say volumes more with silence than one ever could with words.

And Honda could read his suddenly conflicted friend like a book; it was almost second nature for him to understand that something was wrong.

"What's eating at you man, you've been staring into space all day today," the statement had been coupled with the usual habit that Honda seemed to have picked up somewhere around their third year of high school, that certain way of just looking at a person out of the corner of his eye that stated very flatly that he expected to receive an answer regardless of if the other person wanted to offer one. "It's starting to make me think your brain got stolen by one of those damn toys of Kaiba's."

Jou almost snickered at the words, for some reason he thought them far more amusing than the actual point of the matter. Truth be told he would have rather suffered such a fate then have to explain why it was the day found him so wrapped up in thoughts to a well meaning but still very stern best friend.
"Ah...nothing much. Just thinkin' some things over."

"Since when do you think?" The mild verbal jab had the desired effect and Honda grinned just the slightest bit when Jou made a face and tried to swat at him with his bookbag. Seeing his best friend annoyed was still better than watching him mutter and worry over whatever was bothering him.

"I think more than you do," the reply was flat and empty, barely up to par with the blonde's normal retorts. "And I don't know...thinkin' about that paper we had today."

"The essay? Yeah, that was rough...psychology always is. It was just one question, probably won't even matter that much on our final grades." And there was Honda, true to form as far as Jou was concerned, looking at a bigger picture more than himself and missing some of the little but important details. It never did take long before the brunette pieced the details together, Jou had learned to just wait for it to happen instead of pointing out the obvious and it always did.

This time the realization was marked only by a quiet 'oh' from the other teen.

Yes, that was the perfect tone and phrase to sum up life that day, 'oh'.

Jou found it difficult to do anything but offer a shallow nod as he side-stepped a slick puddle of oily rainwater in the street where they walked. He would have dwelled on it a bit more if not for his thoughts being dashed by Honda's voice; it always cut a rough and clear path into the blonde's focus.
"You really don't think it means anything do you? Come on man...it doesn't. People don't really turn into the same type of people their parents were." The words were offered more as comfort than fact because neither could guess if there was any truth to it or not.

Jou sighed and ran a hand up to push aside a few strands of dirty blonde that had fallen across his eyes when a slight breeze had rushed past the two, chilly and sharp. "I dunno, everybody else seems to."

Honda said nothing; hands quickly found worn jacket pockets and sought refuge there. He let his friend speak; knowing the spark of fire that had suddenly blazed up in the other's eyes meant a lengthy one-sided discussion for Jou. Long ago he had discovered that more often then not his friend needed someone to listen without speaking; he had to work out the problem for himself and refused to let anyone else do it for him.

"I mean it, everybody is getting that way. I've seen it a lot more the past year then before then. Eh, Yuug walks around now like he knows everything without being a jerk about it, you goin' tell me that don't sound like his grandfather? And you do that eye thing now." Joey felt as though he was rambling on without finding his point, but at least it made him feel a little better.

Honda could not help but be bemused though. "Eye thing?"

"The glare thing, when you stare at somebody without lookin at them. Your dad does that, it used to creep me out...made me feel like I was in trouble every time I ran into him at your house." Even after Jou had explained Honda still felt a little amused by the thought, he knew well enough his father's ability to make a person feel intimidated without being mean because he had been on the receiving end of that look many times but had never really noticed picking up the habit himself. Maybe Jou was right, he pondered, at least about the small things.

And that was where he decided to break into his friend's tangent before it became too heavy.

"Those are just habits. I know you can't help your dad being a jerk but that's as far as it goes, you'd never be the same type of person he is," while he spoke Honda took a moment to think over the man in question. He had avoided Jou's father for the most part, a deep dislike of the man firmly rooted in him from the start ever since his best friend had tried to explain away a bruised eye that Honda had been well aware of as not the result of any of the fights he had stood beside Jou during.

There was something about the man that bothered Honda deeply, some streak that he was certain Jou would never possess. What puzzled and worried him though was the fact that his friend thought otherwise. "You couldn't be the same as him."

"Maybe.." Jou did not sound very convinced of the fact, his golden-brown eyes lingering on the dreary day around them. He would never forgive himself if it turned out any other way, if by some flaw in his own character he became the very man he had spent so much time keeping his distance from.

Jou had always held pride in the fact that he was strong and steady, that he never backed down from a fight but there were times he had to wonder if it was all just the beginnings of something worse. He was fearful of the truth, that perhaps in the end it would all turn from self-assured purpose to a need to control. His father reeked of that, it was the last thing Jou wanted.

"You awake in there? I told you, it's not going to happen. Don't let it mess you up so bad." Honda's words woke his mind some and Jou gave a nod as he walked. Something turned over and lingered in the that dark place, some thought that had him tangled up in sticky webs.

Honda could see it in those warm eyes, could pick up the flickers of nameless little horrors that his friend faced, his personal inner demons. It was wearing Jou down; they both knew it, wearing him thin. It had to put to an end somehow, before it stole away all of the light in the teen's gaze. But neither of them had the answer, not then, not yet.
Truth was realtive, change constant, and for a second that left two friends sharing the same chill, hope was questioned.