A/N: Greeting all and thanks once again to everybody who reviewed! I always enjoy getting feed back on my writing! Oh, and I apologize – Crowler's first name is 'Vellian'; I spelled it wrong in the last chapter! Anyway, on with the next chapter!
Chapter 4: Rescue Attempts
The students of North Academy sat and watched the screen of the television on the wall of the assembly room with only vague interest. There had been nothing particularly interesting on so far in the news bulletin they were watching and even Chancellor Foster looked to be nodding off. The news, however, was the students' only connection to the rest of the world while they were in school so they kept watching hoping that something slightly less boring would come on. As if hearing their silent request, the smiling broadcaster started to introduce a new report.
"And in other news – today, the world famous Duel Academy was attacked by a herd of wild fan girls. No one is, as of yet, sure how the fans managed to make it onto the Island but the information that has been given out to the press suggests that they somehow managed to swim there. This theory, however, seems highly doubtful. We are lucky enough to have one reporter, Tony Hartford, live on the Island at this very moment. Tony, what's going on over there?"
As the picture displayed on the screen switched to one of an apologetic looking man standing a little ways away from the main entrance of Duel Academy, the North Academy students sat up in their chairs and began to listen intently. After all, Chazz Princeton went to Duel Academy and, even though he had left their school a little over a year ago, he had become a bit of a legend among the students. Not just anybody could arrive out of nowhere, beat every single duelist they had to become the best duelist in the school and then, almost as quickly as he had arrived, leave again. After doing something like that it would have been more shocking if the black-coated duelist hadn't become something of a hero.
The reporter looked incredibly nervous as he began to talk,
"Well, Jim, the only way to describe this situation is chaos. These fan girls are like none I've ever seen before! It's impossible to restrain them! According to various eyewitness accounts approximately four, possibly five, students have been captured and still more are on the run. Not only have the girls struck among the members of the student body but several members of the faculty have also been attacked." As the reporter said this, the doors of the Academy behind him burst open and a tall, bodybuilder-type young man came striding out. He was carrying a thankfully fully clothed Dr. Crowler upside down and hugging his ankles, looking extremely pleased with himself. Dr. Crowler, on the other hand, was clawing at the ground with his hands tarring up clods of dirt and grass in his attempts to escape. The fan guy, spotting the camera, shifted Crowler's feet so that he was holding them with only one arm, and waved cheerfully at the camera crew. The reporter's face went ghastly white.
Just then, possibly due to the change of the fan guy's grasp, Crowler's feet slipped out of his boots and he rolled away. Springing to his feet, Crowler screeched,
"FREEDOM!!!" as he sprinted away as fast as humanly possible. The fan guy looked for a second at the empty boots in his hands, looking very distraught, and then took off after Crowler, yelling,
"Vellian, my love! Where are you going???"
The reporter, who looked like he was about to be sick and mentally scarred for life, opened his mouth to continue only to be interrupted again as Chazz leapt down from embankment that the left wall of the entrance was built into and flattened himself against the wall in the shadow created in the corner. He made desperate 'I'm not here' gestures at the reporter who was staring at him with his mouth hanging open. The ground began to shake slightly and the camera turned to face the direction Chazz had just come from.
The fan girls were stampeding towards the wall. All of them wore black headbands tied around their heads and one of the leaders of the pack was carrying the long pole with the coat/flag fluttering and snapping at the end of it as she ran. They were all also shouting with the excitement of the chase but none of what they were saying could be understood because they weren't bothering with talking in unison anymore. The girls came leaping over the wall and thundered passed the terrified reporter, not noticing Chazz hiding against the wall. The general impression of the whole scene was of that of a fox hunt with Chazz playing the part of the fox, the fan girls playing both the parts of the riders and the hounds, and the reporter playing the part of the innocent bystander who accidentally gets trampled to death by the horses.
Chazz pushed away from the wall, leaned forward with his hands on his knees for a couple of moments breathing hard, and then turned, scrambled back up over the wall and sprinted away again in the direction he had just come from. The reporter stared after the teenager's rapidly diminishing form for nearly a minute before slowly, hesitantly, turning back towards the camera, glancing nervously over his shoulder to make sure that nobody else was coming.
"W-well there y-you ha-have it, J-Jim. Th-that's the latest fr-from D-Duel Acad-demy Island," the reporter managed to stutter before fainting.
Standing up, Chancellor Foster turned off the news report. There was dead silence in the assembly room for about two minutes and then everyone burst into a buzz of conversation which mainly consisted of shouting out opinions.
"We've gotta go help Chazz!" yelped one the students above the noise. There was a general sound of agreement from the other members of the Academy except for some of the freshmen who hadn't recognized Chazz Princeton on the television.
"Yeah, we can't just leave him to those fan girls!" Everyone began clamoring at once at the thought of what might happen if they didn't interfere but were immediately quiet as their Chancellor yelled for silence.
"Now I know you all want to help, but I can't allow it! I cannot let you leave this school without a proper chaperone and parent permission!" There was a very glum shuffling of feet as the students heard this. Then, from his seat in the back of the room, the Czar, who was still currently the school's best duelist, called out with his thick Russian accent,
"But Chancellor Foster! Doesn't Miss Dorothy still work at Duel Academy?"
Foster froze and thought for a moment, then thrust one hand into the air index finger raised,
"I'll get the submarine!"
(back on Duel Academy Island in an open field where a group of miscellaneous fan girls are relaxing)
Little Belowski looked doubtfully at the girls and then at the Chancellor standing next to him.
"I'm sorry, dude, but this is totally unchill."
"Please, just make them fall asleep so that they can be removed!" begged Chancellor Sheppard.
"Well, alright, dude. If that's what you really want…"
"Thank you!"
The semi Obelisk Blue student began to walk leisurely towards the girls, sorting through his deck in search of his little buddies, the Mokie-Mokies. When he was about ten feet away one of the fan girls sat up and looked at him, then turn to a couple of other girls beside her and drawled,
"Dude! It's Belowski!" Seven other girls sat up to see if this was, indeed, the case. They were all wearing tie-dyed t-shirts, raggedy faded jeans, and sandals. Slowly they stood up and wandered over to form a semicircle around Belowski.
"Hey, dude. We came to chill out with you and discuss deep issues, man," drawled a different girl from the one who had first spoken. Belowski grinned at them,
"Cool, dudes. We can go over there." The group wandered slowly towards the shade of a small stand of trees. Chancellor Sheppard sighed and put his face in his hands,
"Now what am I supposed to do?"
(somewhere in the woods near Obelisk Blue)
Kittuna, Sartorius's one and only fan girl, sat against a tree and sniffed. Not only had Sartorius managed to lose her, but she'd found out that he was no longer evil!!! This was horrible! How could anything like this have possibly happen?!?
Sniffing again miserably, Kittuna leaned her head back against the tree trunk behind her. What was she going to do? A thought came to her. This was all Jaden Yukki's fault! He would pay for turning Sartorius away from the Light!!! But how? She frowned in concentration and then a nasty smile lit up her features as she came up with a truly evil idea. Standing up, Kittuna put her hands on her hips, threw her head back, and laughed, "Bwahahahahaha! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!"
Turning to head towards the Slifer Red Dorm, she continued grin to herself,
"I shall save you, Master Sartorius! I've worked on my evil laugh too hard to let it go to waste!"
(somewhere else in the woods, between the Ra and Slifer Dorms)
Sartorius hurried along the path glancing occasionally back over his shoulder to make sure that that fan girl wasn't following him again. This was the last thing he needed – a fan girl chasing him around who was obsessed with the Society of Light! He had just wanted some peace and quiet for a few days so that he could just enjoy being himself again before returning to the hustle and bustle of everyday life. Was that too much to ask for? Apparently.
It was during one of his longer glances behind him that Lena came around the corner of the path ahead of him heading in the opposite direction, towards the Ra Dorm. She was en route to retrieve some more supplies and was bouncing along the path despite the fact that she had had to temporarily leave Bastion's side. The reason for her high spirits was that she was wearing Bastion's pants a like a sort of miniature cape with a leg over each shoulder, then crossing across her chest, and tied behind her back.
Sartorius let out a yelp as he turned around to see her coming towards him, but then paused for a moment,
"Wait a minute; you're not wearing white any more."
The Bastion fan girl frowned at him,
"White? Why would I be wearing white? I hate white!" She suddenly got a dreamy, faraway look on her face. "I much prefer yellow!"
Sartorius looked very confused,
"Aren't you Kittuna?" he asked.
"What? Oh! I get it! Nope, I'm Lena. Kittuna's my identical twin sister! She's really weird, though. If we weren't identical, I'd think she was adopted!"
"Oh. I see."
(some where else yet again in the woods of Duel Academy Island)
Jaden zigzagged cautiously through the trees. He'd been separated from Hassleberry nearly half an hour ago when a dozen girls, who all could have easily passed themselves off as ex-marines despite the fact that the oldest among them couldn't have been more than eighteen, had managed to get in between himself and Hassleberry and then herded the younger boy in another direction.
The Slifer leaned against a tree to rest. He was exhausted, though, he hadn't had to run very much since he and Hassleberry had run into Bastion. Jaden began to sink to the ground but sprang back to his feet as he heard footsteps crunching towards him. However, he needn't have bothered because as the owner of the footsteps rounded the bend in the path, his knees buckled and he collapsed, pitching forward to lie face first in the dirt. Jaden hurried over to the other boy's side.
"Hey, Chazz, are you alright?"
Slate gray eyes glared up at him sarcastically,
"Well let's see, Slacker, all in less than twenty-four hours: I've had my clothes stolen, my bedroom stripped of nearly everything I owned, been forced to resort to wearing your clothes, and have been running from fan girls for nearly three hours straight – part of which was caught on tape and is probably being broadcasted on national news as we speak. So, yeah, I feel just great."
"Oh, good! I'm glad to hear that! If it were me, I'd be kinda annoyed, personally!" Jaden grinned obliviously, the sarcastic tone going right over his head. Chazz glowered at him and pulled himself up so that he was leaning on his elbows. He glanced around at the trees over head,
"Where the heck are we anyway?"
"Uh…" Jaden thought for a minute. "I dunno. I was sorta hoping to run into to somebody who did."
"Great, just great," grumbled Chazz under his breath. Far over head, the sun was beginning to sink towards the horizon line and in the forest around the two boys, shadows were beginning to stretch and darken as the afternoon slowly blended into evening. Jaden, who had never been noted for being particularly observant, finally noticed what the other duelist's attire.
"Hey, wait a minute! That's my blazer!"
"My, how perceptive of you, Slacker! It's only taken five minutes to notice!"
"But why are you wearing my blazer?" asked Jaden stoically, ignoring the insult. He began to laugh, "You never wear color, let alone red!"
"I was going to raid your closet before you ran off to save that stupid winged pompom of yours, remember?"
"Uhhhh… nope! No, I don't! But I would like my jacket back."
"No way, Slacker." Chazz folded his arms across his chest.
"Ah, come on, Chazz!" Jaden whined. "It's my blazer and I've been running around with nothing but a towel and bowers on all day!"
"Not my problem."
This went on for quite some time and the two were so busy arguing that neither of them noticed the solitary fan girl walking slowly up to them. Jaden halted in the middle of tackling Chazz as he spotted her and simply stared, unsure what to do.
"What is it, Sla- Uh oh." The boys stood frozen, waiting to see what the girl would do. Putting her hands on her hips the fan girl looked thoughtfully between the two and then walked over to Chazz. He eyed her suspiciously. She stopped and then, with no warning whatsoever, kicked him as hard as she could in the ankle.
"YEEEOWCH!!!" yelp Chazz hopping on one foot so that he could rub the offended limb. "What the heck was that for?!?!?!?!?"
"You should be nicer to Jaden," the fan girl said primly, and then turned and latched herself onto Jaden, her arms wrapped around his chest so tightly that he could barely breathe. "I'm Rebecca," mumbled the girl, "and I love you, Jaden Yukki!!! And I'm never going to let go of you again!!!"
Jaden was fairly certain that he could hear his ribs begin to groan and crack under the constriction of the girl's hold.
"Uh, Chazz?" Jaden managed to wheeze. "A little help here?"
(under the shade of a small group of trees next to the open field where fan girls had been relaxing earlier)
Little Belowski and the girls in tie-dyed t-shirts were sitting in a circle under the trees. Somebody had found a guitar and was now strumming on it gently. Also sitting in the circle was the news reporter and his camera crew. The reporter was still looking rather pale as Belowski talked to him,
"I mean, dude, you've gotta chill out more. Gotta be one with the universe, know what I mean?"
One of the cameramen was dozing on his equipment case. The corner of the reporter's left eye was twitching slightly and he didn't notice as a fly landed on his nose. The fly's wings drooped and it began to snore.
"You- you really th-think it would help?"
"Totally, dude."
A/N: Remember, if you've got a fan girl you want included and/or a suggestion for some mischief the fan girls could get into, just drop me a line! Thanks for reading!