Chapter II: Discovery
Hello, again, GX fans! Sorry for the wait on this chapter, but there was a little problem and it was Peach's fault! So, anyway, wow! Seventeen reviews! Your friendly neighborhood co-authors are very pleased and awed that you've stayed with us this long. To The Rainwalker, yes, Peach did get the information about Komuricon, but alas cannot make it. Anyway, we imagine you're ready for chapter two! So here you are!
Last time, Alexis, Violet, Annie and Rosa all had trouble sleeping due to the events of the summer that they just managed to live through. Each of them was getting sick as a result, especially Annie, who is still recovering from heart surgery and trying to regain the weight she lost. Miss Fontaine was called and sedated all four girls. So what will happen when Jaden, Bastion, Syrus and Tyson Hassleberry are notified of their fiancées' conditions? Read on!
Disclaimer: We don't own GX; we just own our OCs. One of us may own a Nintendo Wii, but we don't own the Nintendo Wii. We wish we did. Then we'd be rich! Rich, I tell you, rich! We also don't own Inuyasha or Fruits Basket.
Authors' note: Bunko-ban is a novel-sized reprint of Japanese manga.
The four girls slept well into the day and of course, their fiancés became worried. Jaden Yuki, in the Slifer Red dorm along with all of his guy buddies noticed the girls' absence at breakfast. "I say, have any of you seen Violet this morning?" Bastion Misawa asked as he came into the Slifer dining room. "She should be here by now…"
"No, Bastion, and I haven't seen Alexis. Tyson...you haven't seen Rosa either?" Jaden asked.
Tyson Hassleberry shook his head. "No. Sam Hill, what's goin' on? Private Truesdale? You seen any of 'em?" he asked Obelisk Blue student Syrus Truesdale.
Syrus sighed, frowning. "I haven't seen Annie this morning, either. I'm really worried..." He had reason to be worried. He had noticed Annie was tired the past few days and remembered yesterday…
"Where are you going, Annie?" the blue-haired boy asked as he and his fiancée walked out of their second class of the day. Usually he and Annie walked straight to their third class together, but today she headed down the hall away from the classrooms to Dorothy's card shack and snack shop.
"Dorothy's… I think I was up too late last night," she explained, sweat-dropping. "Catching up with all we've missed is hard work."
"You need to be careful, Annie," Sy cautioned as they arrived at their destination. "Dr. Benson said you can't overexert yourself. You don't want to have to go through another surgery…" Just a few weeks before, the brown-haired, blue-eyed girl had undergone heart surgery to stop the sudden irregular heartbeats that had nearly taken her life. Consequently, he worried over her a great deal, still fearing he might lose her. "You can't get it made up in two weeks as much as we missed." He noticed her cheeks looked hollow still, and how terribly thin she still looked. "You aren't gaining your weight back quick enough, Annie and you need to."
"I'm okay, Sy," she soothed, managing to hold back her irritability. She knew she was feeling irrationally crabby, and she'd had chocolate muffins this morning to hold it back. "I just need a latte or something. Hey, Dorothy," she greeted the plump woman in glasses behind the counter.
"Hi, Annie. Good morning, Syrus," Dorothy greeted cheerfully. "What can I get for you today?"
"Dorothy, I'd like a grande latte with a shot of chocolate and a triple shot of espresso. I think I need a pick-me-up."
"Again?" the plump older woman asked curiously, some concern visible in her brown eyes. "You've been hitting the books too hard, honey. You missed part of the semester and the teachers understand. Take some time off tonight. Now, Sy, what would you like?"
Sy smiled. "I'd like one of your black cherry smoothies, please, Dorothy."
"Coming right up," Dorothy said, getting their orders. It didn't take long and she handed them their drinks. "Enjoy, kids… And Annie, take it easy, sweetie. We all want to see you better." Annie and Sy thanked her and headed off to class with their drinks.
"Are you sure you're okay, Annie?" the blue-headed male Obelisk asked, frowning with concern.
She just barely stifled a yawn as they headed into Professor Stein's Advanced Dueling History course. "Yeah…I'll be all right, honey," she answered with a smile as they sat in their seats together. He watched her all through the period and throughout the day, but tried to believe what she had said…
Now, a day later, Sy was kicking himself for not seeing how Annie truly was. 'I was with her all summer, and all through her time at the hospital and at home with me… How could I have missed this?' he berated himself.
Meanwhile… "Jesse? You seen them?" Jaden asked his new friend from North Academy.
The boy with teal hair and green eyes who bore more than a passing resemblance to the brunette Slifer Red shook his head. "Nope. Haven't seen hide nor hair of 'em since yesterday night, Jay."
"Us either," Axel Brody, an African-American student from West Academy said, indicating Adrian Gecko, a student from East Academy.
"Yeah...last I saw of the girls," Adrian said, "they looked like they hadn't slept in days. Jim?" the red-headed boy with glasses asked the Australian who carried a saltwater crocodile named Shirley on his back.
Jim nodded. "In fact, all four of those Sheilas held a similar look. You think somethin's wrong?" he asked, tipping his tan fedora back, revealing one blue eye and a bandage over the other eye.
"Sam Hill," Tyson groaned. "Let's go see if Miss Fontaine has any answers...If anything's happened to my Spanish Rose..." The Texas boy with the cut-off blazer, dark dreadlocks, tanned skin and hazel eyes thought back to three days ago when he'd had dance lessons with Rosa…
"One, two, three, one, two, three… Ouch!" Tyson yelped in the school dance studio. Usually at his dance lessons with his lovely and fiery betrothed, she was the one saying, "Ouch," as he clumsily stepped on her smaller foot. But today…
"Ty-Ty… I'm sorry," Rosa apologized in Spanish. "I keep stepping on your feet."
Tyson looked into his fiancée's warm brown eyes with concern and kept an understanding smile on his face. "It's all right, darlin'," he answered, also in Spanish. "You're just havin' an off day is all. Why don't we take a break? You can still teach me how to dance the bolero when you're feelin' on? We did study late last night…"
"Yes, we did…I ended up staying up later after we finished, reading the history notes from class," she explained, stretching the truth a bit. The truth was, she hadn't been able to get to sleep after the study group broke up and so stayed up reading her notes to relax her mind. But Tyson didn't know that. "I needed to be clear on the material," she concluded.
"Well, we can take a break from dancin' and studyin' and just relax, okay? We can go get a fruit smoothie from Miss Dorothy," he suggested.
"That would be wonderful, Ty-Ty," she agreed…
Tyson now, three days after the fact, was mentally kicking himself. 'What if I missed somethin'? I'm supposed to protect her!'
"Violet..." Bastion muttered. Yesterday afternoon, she too had made an excuse…
"BASTION-BABY!" Violet shouted as she strode across the campus. She was moving a little slower than usual, and her shout hadn't been as loud. But she still managed to reach him in seconds and crash into him with her hug.
Bastion had prepared himself for the usual crash to the ground and the laughs and giggles from onlookers. But today, he just felt her considerably softer impact. "Hello, darling! How are you this morning?" he asked, looking down at her.
Violet grinned and kept her arms around him. "Great! A little tired, but I did stay up a bit late last night."
He noticed she looked a bit paler than usual, but had a slight pink flush to it. He couldn't have known that she was wearing make-up to conceal the beginnings of exhaustion. "You do look a little bit tired, but still radiant, love... Were you up studying?" he asked.
She giggled, blushing a bit. "You know I don't study like that. I was busy reading this new manga I got and didn't realize the time...heh..." Violet hated lying, even if it was more like stretching the truth. She'd been scared to go to sleep and had read some manga to get her mind off of the nightmare.
"Which one was it this time?" he asked, having learned her collection backward and forward while she was recovering during the summer and in the early fall in Domino. "Were you reading Silver Flamer? Or the bunko-ban of Inuyasha?"
"Actually, it was Fruits Basket. Remember that one?"
"Oh, yes...It's a good thing they made a bunko-ban of that," he observed, smiling.
She returned the smile and was going to reply, but was interrupted by a large yawn. "Oh, man...sorry about that."
Bastion sighed, laughing a little. "Shall we get you some hot chocolate before you end up snoring in Professor Stein's class...again?" he asked, remembering yesterday's class where Violet had ended up out-snoring Jaden. Professor Stein had actually shown anger marks.
Violet blushed and sweat-dropped. "Good idea...Professor Stein looked pretty mad at the end of class..."
"Considering it's him...that's extraordinary. But darling, I wouldn't have you any other way but the way that you are."
"And I wouldn't want you to be any different, either, Bastion-baby..." And so they headed to Dorothy's where he got an Earl Grey tea and she got a hot chocolate.
'I should have seen it then,' Bastion thought, angry at himself. Throughout the summer when she had been injured and into the early fall as she recovered, he had kicked himself for not protecting her better. He was now angry at himself if there had been another failure on his part.
"Darn it, Lex...why wouldn't you tell me?" Jaden whispered. He, too, had noticed Alexis acting unlike herself, but had somewhat ignored it…
Two days ago, Jaden was sitting in Professor Stein's Dueling History class, trying his best to stay awake for once. "Lex…what's a Neolithic Cro-Magnon?" he whispered to his fiancée, who was sitting next to him and always paid attention. But today… "Alexis?!" he whispered in shock. She was sound asleep, her head on the desk.
"Mr. Yuki, is there a…problem?" Professor Benjamin Stein, a man with longish dark hair and glasses asked, then noticing one of his favorite pupils sleeping. "Miss Rhodes…is asleep?"
Jaden nodded. "Yes, sir," he answered in a normal voice. "Lex? Lex? Babe, wake up!"
"Miss Rhodes…are you all right?" the professor asked, gently shaking the girl's shoulder.
Alexis finally woke up, and realized Professor Stein, Jaden and most of the class was eyeing her with major concern. "Uh…hi?" she said, blushing a bit. "Jaden…what's going on?"
"Babe…you took a nap," he explained, sweat-dropping. "We're all surprised. You don't fall asleep in class."
"Miss Rhodes, is everything all right?" Professor Stein asked, clearly concerned.
She was still blushing and answered, "Yes, sir. I just was up late last night studying. I'm really sorry." Jaden's eyebrows raised, knowing the gang's study group had broken up at 10:00.
"It's all right, Miss Rhodes. Just try to stay with us, all right?"
"Yes, sir," she answered. After the teacher stepped away, she sat up a little straighter.
Jaden whispered, "Are you okay?"
"I'm fine," she answered, a little bit shortly. He must've shown some hurt in his face because she then added, "Sorry, Jay… I guess I shouldn't have stayed up so late. I'll get a coffee after class…"
"Well, take a nap after our classes are over, babe, okay?" he asked.
"Sure," she agreed, and they tuned back into the lesson.
Now, two days later, the Slifer Red boy was furious with himself. "Lex…darn it…I should've seen something was wrong with you," he muttered under his breath.
"Annie...please be okay," Syrus also spoke under his breath, the prayer audible only to him. The boys raced through their food and ran to the Obelisk dorms, Syrus in the lead as he was an Obelisk Blue by rank. Miss Fontaine just happened to be stepping out the front door when they arrived. "Miss Fontaine! We need to talk to you!!" Syrus called as they ran up to her.
"Oh, hello, Syrus. Hello, boys; is everything all right?" she asked.
"Miss Fontaine? Where's Alexis?" Jaden asked.
"Where's Violet?" Bastion added without ceremony.
"Yeah, Miss Fontaine, where's Rosa?" Tyson asked urgently.
"And Annie??" Syrus added worriedly.
"Oh, goodness, nobody told you..." she realized. "Boys, they're sound asleep right now. I had to sedate them early this morning. I think you've all noticed that they're all exhausted..."
Syrus frowned; he had noticed, but hadn't thought it was bad enough that Miss Fontaine would have to sedate them. "But...why can't they get any sleep? Is something wrong??" he asked, face paling.
"They've been waking up screaming every night since they got back to school," she answered, face tight with concern.
"Nightmares?" Axel asked, a worried expression on his face. He might not have been with the group at Duel Academy Central only a few weeks, but he truly felt part of it. He remembered his father talking about each of the young men that trained under him at boot camp and how he got close to the boys who became men. And those boys got close to each other. Axel hadn't experienced it personally until now. And now he worried for the young women who he regarded as sisters.
"Yes...I can't be sure, but it may be all that happened to you kids this summer took its toll," Miss Fontaine explained further.
"Violet," Bastion breathed. "Miss Fontaine? May we see them?"
"All right...but they're all out and asleep in Annie and Violet's suite," she allowed.
The guys realized they had never been to Violet and Annie's room, or even the girls' dorm. Well, all except for Chazz, but he wasn't exactly with them at the moment. "Uh...Miss Fontaine? Where exactly is there room??" Syrus asked, grinning sheepishly.
"I'll take you...Annie and Violet are on the third floor. Jesse, Jim, Axel, Adrian, you four haven't tried to sneak over to the girls' dorms?" she teased, mirth in her gray eyes. She knew all too well the ways of young men and had occasionally caught boys trying to sneak into the girls' dorms.
"No way," Axel said, his dark features unable to hide a slight blush. It wasn't that he wasn't interested, but he knew he didn't want to have to answer to his mother. 'I can hear Mama now… "AXEL POWELL BRODY! YOU DO NOT TREAT YOUNG LADIES THAT WAY! DADDY AND I RAISED YOU BETTER THAN THAT!" I would be so busted,' he thought, mentally shivering. Kassidy Brody was not someone to be trifled with when angry.
"Nuh-uh," Adrian added, grinning slyly. "Not that the Duel Academy girls aren't pretty..." There was a girl he definitely liked who was some distance away, but that didn't mean he didn't look at what was available to him.
Jim raised an eyebrow at Adrian's remark, but decided not to say anything. "Never had a reason to sneak over," he replied simply with a shrug. Jim much preferred to hang out with his pet crocodile, Shirley and to commune with nature. He liked girls, but just wasn't interested in looking for one yet.
Jesse shook his head. "Me neither. Spend most of my time at the Slifer dorms." He had a girlfriend back home, and good friends here at the school. Further, pranking the girls in their dorms didn't enter the southern boy's head.
"Uh...I snuck into the Obelisk dorm once...Zane's room," Jaden groaned. Those not in the know looked at him in shock. "It was a girl's fault! She snuck in first and I was trying to figure out why..."
"Her name was Blair Flannigan," Bastion explained, smiling wryly. "She's quite the prodigious duelist..."
"Don't remind me," Jaden groaned as they walked through the dorms.
"Men on the floor!" Miss Fontaine shouted suddenly, startling the boys.
Syrus blinked in confusion. "Uh, was there a reason for that?" he asked.
"Yes, there is. We like letting girls know there are guys around," Miss Fontaine explained. "Some of the girls leave their doors open..."
"Ah...that's like when I took Violet to the Ra dormitories," Bastion remembered.
As if to emphasize Miss Fontaine's explanation, they heard a few doors slam shut. Syrus looked over at Bastion. "You did? What'd she say about your room??" he asked, remembering the walls.
"She loved it," Bastion said. "She was the first person other than my parents to like my walls. She saw it before you two did, Jaden and Syrus..."
"Yeah?" Jaden asked, surprised.
"Yeah," the tall Ra answered, smiling. "She came to my room a couple of days before you two ended up helping me repaint the walls. She really liked the walls. She didn't think me unusual at all…" The conversation had lightened the mood a bit, but the mood tensed again when they reached the girls' room.
"They're all sound asleep, and quite frankly, I doubt they're going to wake up right now. The sedative is very strong...I can't use it on them for too long," Miss Fontaine said gently as she opened the bedroom door. It was the first time any of these boys had seen an Obelisk girls' dorm room, much less Annie and Violet's suite. There was a pretty sitting area with a couple of big off-white leather couches as well as a TV and a Wii Generation 2 gaming console and Wii Fit.
"Wow...what a set-up," Jaden breathed, in awe of how the outer room looked.
"No wonder Annie got so upset at the inequality," Bastion commented quietly. He too was awed at the sheer magnitude of the room. And now he could only imagine what the bedrooms looked like. 'I guess I'll find out momentarily,' he thought. The four transfer boys sat down on the couches while Miss Fontaine got the engaged boys into the bedrooms. Annie and Violet were sound asleep on Annie's big bed in her room while Alexis and Rosa were sleeping in Violet's room.
The girls all had bags under their eyes and were pale from lack of sleep, and were in a deep sleep from the sedative. Now that the boys knew something was wrong, they could tell just how exhausted the girls had been. None of the four were wearing any make-up, so the dark bags under their eyes were very obvious. "Miss Fontaine...can't we do something?" Syrus asked, frowning at Annie's hollow cheeks, painfully thin body and very pale skin.
Bastion sat on the edge of the bed and brushed Violet's bangs. "Oh, Violet...darling, why didn't you tell me it was this bad?" he murmured softly, mercilessly kicking himself for not seeing it.
Miss Fontaine looked at the two worried boys in Annie's room. "We have to figure something out. The sedative I gave the girls is very strong. They can't be on it longer than a couple of days or they could get addicted and not be able to sleep without it," she answered loudly enough that the boys in Violet's room could hear her too. Jaden and Tyson looked up in shock from their location, but noticed their fiancées were dead to the world. Miss Fontaine saw the looks they'd given and added, "It makes them sleep very soundly, so we can talk normally.
Suddenly, Syrus realized something. "Hey, they didn't have these nightmares before. It started when they got to Duel Academy, right? Why are they having them now??" he asked. Sure, Annie had cried out in her sleep a couple of times, but she'd curled again him and been able to go back to sleep.
"Hmmm...what's different between this summer and now? How did the girls sleep this summer?" the nurse asked, trying to put the figurative pieces of the girls' health puzzle together.
The boys thought for a few minutes, and then Syrus' eyes widened in realization once again. "They...they were sleeping with us. I mean, in the same beds. Now, they're sleeping alone."
"I see," Miss Fontaine said, thinking quickly. "I'll have to call Chancellor Shepherd. We may have to do something for the girls' sake..." 'And it's not allowed,' she thought, 'but maybe we can allow it for these kids.'
"Miss Fontaine," Tyson asked without asking.
"It'll be all right," she soothed. Syrus thought he knew what Miss Fontaine meant, and wondered if the chancellor would allow it. It would probably be the first time since the academy was started that such a request was made. A moment later, the pretty school nurse confirmed his suspicions.
"I think I can talk Chancellor Shepherd into allowing a...coed arrangement. After all, their health is at stake. And I know you boys well enough to know that you're all good boys," she stated.
"Thanks, Miss Fontaine," Jaden said gratefully.
"Yes, thank you," Bastion added, relieved he might be able to do something to help his love.
"R-Really? Thanks, Miss Fontaine," Syrus replied gratefully, impressed that his guess was correct.
"No problem, Syrus...you, especially, are a good one. I think you're the sweetest boy that's ever come to Duel Academy," the nurse smiled.
Syrus blushed a little at the compliment, gingerly rubbing the back of his neck. "Uh, thanks, Miss Fontaine," he muttered.
"Well, it's true...you are," she said fondly. "Anyway, I'm sure I can get Chancellor Shepherd to also...promote you three in all but name..."
"What?" Jaden yelped. 'If she said what I think she said, I'll go up two dorms!' he thought in shock.
"Sam Hill," Tyson breathed, amazed.
"Oh, my," Bastion muttered. He had been a Ra his entire tenure at the academy; to suddenly change was rather an intense, but not unpleasant idea.
"So...they'd be like Obelisks?" Syrus asked, wrapping his mind around the idea.
"Yes, they would. Jaden refused promotion in his first year, remember?" she reminded Syrus.
He nodded. "So did Bastion, after he dueled Chazz."
"Would we change our blazers?" Bastion wondered.
"You don't have to...In fact, it may just amount to moving," Miss Fontaine explained.
"I can live with that," Jaden said grinning, then sobering abruptly. "I need to call Atticus and Chazz. They have to know..." He liked being a Slifer and couldn't see himself in anything but the red blazer. But that thought gave way to his future brothers-in-law and how they would about this.
Syrus nodded; they were Alexis' brothers, and they'd want to know about the other girls as well. "So, Miss Fontaine, when should the girls wake up?" he asked. He wanted to talk to Annie about all of this. 'She might not be okay with this… But what if she is?! Oh, man,' he thought.
"Probably not until tomorrow morning, Syrus. As I said, this is a powerful medicine," the nurse explained. The other boys made sounds of concern and worry.
His eyes widened in surprise. "No wonder you don't want to keep giving it to them..."
"Yes...they were so tired and frightened, though, I saw no other way to give them some uninterrupted sleep..."
"Miss Fontaine...did they say why they were so frightened?" Bastion asked.
"No...all they said was that they were really scared of their dreams..."
"Maybe they can tell us when they wake up," Syrus offered.
"Yeah...what could be scarin' Rosa so bad?" Tyson wondered. "She don't scare easy..."
"Neither does Violet," Bastion added.
"Lex doesn't either," Jaden added as he headed to the phone to call Atticus and Chazz.
"Annie can get scared...but it must be something bad to make her too afraid to sleep well," Syrus added. Even when she was scared during the summer, he reflected, she got enough sleep. For the current situation to affect her this way… Well, it must be pretty bad, he mused.
"Well...maybe you can stay here until they wake up," she suggested.
The small bluenette blinked. "All four of us??"
Miss Fontaine nodded. "I'll talk to Chancellor Shepherd since he's the head of the school, but I run the Obelisk girls' dorm, and I say it's okay." She got up and headed out of Annie's room to talk with the other four boys in the sitting area. Axel and Jesse were competing on the Wii, while Jim and Adrian watched. They paused the game and turned to Miss Fontaine as she came from the rooms. They wanted to do something, anything, to help their new friends.
"So what's gonna happen now?" Jesse asked for them all.
"I'll have you four return to your dorms this evening, but I need you each to do me a favor. Won't you?" she requested.
"Of course. What's the favor?" asked Jim easily.
"Get Tyson, Bastion, Syrus and Jaden their pajamas, okay? And head down to Dorothy's and get some treats for yourselves and the boys on my account, all right?"
"Wow. Thanks, Miss Fontaine!" Jesse gave a fake salute. "We're on it, right guys?" he asked the other three. Jim nodded.
"You bet!" Axel said.
"Okay, Miss Fontaine. Are you sure you want to..?" Adrian began.
"Don't worry, you four. Just do as I say. Thank you," Miss Fontaine answered smiling.
"All right! Let's get movin', guys!!" Jesse cheered, and the four trooped out of the room.
So the young men are truly aware of the young women's conditions and are at their sides. Will Miss Fontaine's solution to the problem be allowed? How will Chazz and Atticus react to Jaden living with their sister? Find out next time in "Dark Dreams!" And until next time, please read, review and stay tuned! Thank you!