A/N Enough of the authors notes already – on with the story!

Chazz was miserable. Much more miserable than he had ever been in his entire life. Much more miserable than he thought anyone could ever been in the history of the world… ever – and, in his mind, that included the starving orphans and math teachers of the world. In fact, he decided, he had redefined the word, making it now about ten times worse. He supposed this was the kind of feeling that would engulf the earth's population only when the world ended – yes it was truly that bad.

However the biggest problem was not how miserable he felt, but why he felt so miserable. It was obviously that he'd failed that last exam in Crowler's class – yes that had to be it… Failing an exam was enough to bring anyone's mood down; right? But then there was why he'd failed the exam – the reason being he couldn't concentrate so he'd finally given into temptation and spent the entire hour drawing Zane on his exam paper. Chazz's cheeks flushed red at the mere thought of it even now, when he was alone in his room.

But why the hell had he been drawing Zane on his exam paper? The only reason he could think of was the fact that he hated the older guy so much that he couldn't express himself in words. He hated him for sneaking into his room that night. He hated him for kissing him. He hated Zane for making him loose all his sleep that night. He hated him for kidnapping him and dragging him off down to the beach. He hated him for snogging him. He hated him for just sitting in class and being so easy to stare at. He hated Zane for getting causing him to get a detention. He hated him for making out with him. He hated him for walking away. Chazz hated Zane for his expressionless cobalt eyes. He hated the way Zane's cerulean hair blew slightly on the wind. But most of all he hated the way Zane made him feel so alive, so fortunate, and so… wanted.

Chazz scowled and scooped up his bag for first lesson. Really, what was he going on about? Zane Truesdale should burn in hell.

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An extremely ill tempered Chazz Princeton was stomping through Duel Academy. Obviously his mood was not at it's best and any younger members of the school, or Slifers, had learnt to steer well clear of the certain raven haired boy; and it was only nine in the morning and fifteen minutes until first class began.

There were a couple of contributing factors to Chazz's bad temper; he was pissed off cause it was raining and the long walk from the Slifer dorm to the main academy building had saturated not only him, but his clothes, and he just knew he was going to smell of damp all day. Not only that, his hair was plastered to his head in an extremely unflattering way – well he supposed a certain seaweed brain might call it 'cute', and lastly, but not least, that certain seaweed brain was making himself extremely scarce.

As ever the problem was Chazz hated Zane; and the fact that Zane wasn't even showing up to receive the verbal beating of a lifetime just infuriated Chazz more. Zane was always there when Chazz didn't want him to be, but never there when he wanted him. And so the verbal abuse Chazz had in store for the older Truesdale was now simmering over the brim and leaking out at everyone and anyone Chazz could find to yell at. Whether it was yelling at Jaden to stop being stupid and borrowing his toothbrush or screaming at the random Slifer who'd just passed for being 'ugly' Chazz has already insulted almost everyone at the school so far today, and, as said afore, it was only just nine in the morning.

However, one person, who definitely wasn't making themselves scarce was a certain Obelisk lady; Alexis Rhodes. For some reason she'd kept popping up, whether it was turning up to walk with him to the classrooms, as she had done, offering to share breakfast with him, as she had done, or just gibbering on about Zane for a solid hour, as she had done, Alexis Rhodes was not leaving him alone and far from what he'd expected of the situation; it was annoying.

Chazz had no idea why he'd suddenly picked up this female stalker, but right now he really didn't feel like having an entourage of Zane fan-girls and though he'd managed to ditch Alexis with her friends he was somehow sure he'd be seeing her again before the day was through. But there was something very off about it all, something odd that Chazz couldn't quite put his finger on…

If Chazz had thought he was having a bad day already by twelve o'clock his life had turned to hell. The only annoying thing was however much he swore or yelled at others he couldn't get over his anger; but it wasn't a usual anger. There was some kind of soreness to it too that Chazz definitely didn't like and he definitely wasn't used to.

"Hey Chazz – don't you love the way his hair falls about his face… it's so pretty…"

Chazz cocked an eyebrow to himself and placed another forkful of rice in his mouth to stop himself from having to talk. Did he like the way Zane's hair fell about his face? No! No he did not like the way Zane's hair feel about his face because obviously the most glaring best feature was Zane's eyes.

Chazz choked.

"Hey Chazz – you okay?" Alexis thumped him hard on the back and some rice shot out of his mouth and across the table, and then a deep laughter from across the room to cause a scarlet blush to rise in Chazz's cheeks. So Zane was actually there. He hadn't noticed him before; well he hadn't registered Zane before, mostly because he'd been seeing his face everywhere lately… in hate… of course.

Chazz grumpily pulled his glass of water towards him and downed it all, glaring daggers at the annoyingly happy Zane – honestly – who the hell did he think he was? Acting all happy when Chazz was feeling so annoyed. Someone should go over and cut all of Zane's stupid seaweed hair off; pluck it right off his head. Though a bald Zane wouldn't be half as good looking and that would be a shame…

Obviously, Chazz decided, his mind had been warped by Alexis' constant blabberings about how wonderful Zane was. Why was she even talking to him about Zane anyway? It didn't make any sense. In fact nothing made any sense apart from the fact Chazz wanted to climb across the table and snog Zane right there and right then. And that was why Chazz stood up quite suddenly to leave the Obelisk dinning room, which Alexis had practically dragged him to, without thinking and that was why Alexis accidentally spilt her water all down the front of Chazz's trousers.

Practically glowing with embarrassment Chazz didn't stop walking until he was safely outside. The world wasn't scheduled to end for another couple of billion years; though it seemed that his was already crumbling at the edges.

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Alexis grinned to herself as she sat, now alone in the Obelisk dining room. Right now the best she could do was annoy Chazz; and though that was fun, for a while, the excitement died out pretty quickly. However she knew what she was going to do. And though her plan was not completed exactly, and the final stages weren't detailed, she had the idea and she had the plan.

For nothing could be quite as embarrassing as admitting you liked Zane Truesdale in front of the entire school; especially not when you were former Obelisk Blue – Chazz Princeton.

However things needed to be changed and arranged and Alexis needed to plan but who better to go for, for advice than someone she trusted who knew all about social things. Alexis needed to pay Atticus a visit.

A/N Crap! Yup. Worst chapter EVER. Though I owed at least something and at 1:10am – 1:35am this is the best I've got. Flame if you like… I kinda split my ideas for this chap up into two separate ones so the next chap will have all the action in it. Promise!