They were a damaged lot, covered with enough cuts and bruises to sate any number of playgrounds. Whoever had been throwing the stones had been hindered by the dimming light and their leafy covers but enough damage had been done – not a single Slifer had managed to escape the barrage untouched. Yugi had a thick plaster along his hairline while most of his students were concealing growing bruises beneath their uniforms and all of them were carrying a more dreadful wound. "Right guys," He paused at the door of the cafeteria. After what had happened the last time they went outside, his followers were understandably nervous about the long trek back to the main building. "Let's go."
With half-hearted steps, they gradually huddled about him and crept up the dusty path that lay outside. Getting to the top of the first ridge marked their first drop in speed as they came within throwing distance of the tree line. "Still got that bat handy?" Back by popular demand, Steve was carrying the heavy lump of wood that had been their saving grace against the last volley.
"Yes." Like Yugi, he kept his tone locked in stoic determination. Growing up around political situations had taught him how to keep a steady voice at all times. "I'm not sure that anyone will believe it's a woodworking project though." Carrying a club around would draw suspicion but lugging a heavy piece of timber to the workshop to carve would be easier to accept.
"Do you think anyone up there knows what a cricket bat looks like?" Even though he had played a few games under Professor Julius while working towards his doctorate, Yugi still couldn't understand the nearly triangular shape of the bat. Baseball made far more sense as a sport.
They slowed again as they reached a point in the road where frantic evasions had disturbed the ground and left dust coating a large area beyond the path. "Let's keep it moving." Not eager for a repeat of the night before, Steve ushered the group onwards. Yugi privately reminded himself to grant the young man a suitable reward at some point.
Everything became a little easier the further up the path they went. By the time they had reached the paved road that linked the docks to the academy, they were even recovered enough to wish Miguel would stop talking for a moment. It was a palpable difference in mood. "Remember, don't mention what happened to anyone." They'd already discussed a game plan to deal with the stoning but the jovial mood could lead his students to more impulsive decisions. "Let them think they got away with it for now but I'll make a point to push it at the next staff meeting." If he could extend an already overrunning meeting another five minutes to discuss budgets, he could certainly convince the faculty to treat assault as seriously as it should be.
"Now, let's focus on today's lesson." Winding along a stairwell, he called out individual objectives for the group as they neared the studio. "Suzuki, I want you and Hashi to work on his outline a bit more – try and imagine how it would look if it was either of you." He had some first-hand experience having to embody a summoned creature and didn't want anyone in the future to suffer from Hashi's poor artwork. "Botan, I'd like to see a bit more done towards your card's effect or lore but you're free to continue the artwork if you want. Otherwise," He elbowed open a fire door and counted the students filtering past. None lost yet. "Join Zaw, Jiro, and help Miguel trim back his essay a little bit." The students – Miguel included – had a good laugh at that. His description was nearing a thousand words instead of the more traditional range of fifty.
"What about me and Jun?" Steve voiced his concern about being left off the list alongside the Chinese transfer. "You want us on security?" While not the armed warrior his counterpart was, Jun could serve as a backup as well as any of the rest of them.
"You two are doing fine as you are." Yugi was firm in his refusal of the offer. "I'd advise that you check with the rest of the feedback as you go – the same applies to all of you!" He ordered as he followed them down the last bit of the hall. "Nobody has a right or wrong answer here but your opinions are worth sharing all the,"
It was evident the second they entered the room. An acrid sort of smell, unlike the usual leftover fumes of paint. A metal bin usually held any waste but it had no signs of burning and the room was otherwise unchanged from how they had left it the night before. No, not entirely – a couple of drawers in the cabinet had tarnished metal running above them. "Check your work." He instantly fell into the commanding tones that came with being the one in charge.
Hurrying over to the cabinets, each student pushed and shoved in their hurry to be the first to find their stored art. One by one, they slowly pulled out the intact work as Yugi checked over the rest of the room. "I don't get it." Jiro sounded nearly disappointed by the lackluster reveal. "All our work is still here." Realisation filtered down to everyone at the same time. Not all their work was untouched.
One by one, they slowly pulled open the drawers which had previously contained their works that had begun under the instruction of Arla. All of them had been reduced to charred wrecks with barely any hint that they had previously had any other colour beyond bureaucratic shades. "Nothing else was burned." Even the paints seemed unaffected from what Yugi could tell. "Why were only these drawers burnt?"
"Fire extinguishing system." Suzuki choked out. "If people's not in here, the windows are closed and all the air gets sucked out." Painting supplies could be extremely flammable or (in large and concentrated enough amounts) explosive. At the first hint of fire, the fire suppression system sucks all the oxygen out of the room to starve the fire. Of course, the students had been taken into account – if any people were detected in the room, water would simply be sprayed over every available surface while they evacuated. Artworks would be lost but the people would survive.
Sadly, the system had only managed to take effect after most of the artwork was already aflame. All the Slifer students had to show for their hours at the easels was enough charcoal grey to paint a depiction of their own ruined work.
"I see." Sifting through the remains in one drawer, he carefully withdrew a fragment of wood from atop what had once been a sheet of canvas. Anyone would have instantly realised that wood had no business being on top of the sheet nor a twisted piece shorter than a hairpin. "Put your artworks" He impulsively ground the remains of the match between his fingers. "That is, your remaining ones, back in the drawers for now. I want you to focus on the mechanics for now." Pulling out his PDA, he scrolled through a contacts list, knowing that this sort of technology was going to be an integral part of daily life in the future. "Dr Rhodes? Could you get Dr Ziesmer and come to the art studio? It's an urgent matter for you both." Ending the call like that was rude but it would have the desired effect. Selecting a different number, he dialled before Alexis had the chance to return his previous call. "Dr Sartyr? It's, yes. Yes, I see. Would you mind coming down to the art studio? I've got a pressing question. Yes, in person." While he might be burned from the necessary fire he had to light under Alexis, the remaining dorm leader was so profusely polite that Yugi wouldn't be surprised if he arrived first.
All four dorm leaders in a single room usually meant trouble for their collective students. After a single look at the ruined drawers, the two blue coats had accepted the despairing cries of the yellow jacket without comment. Despite being the head of the Ra Yellow dorm, Dr Sartyr was liked and respected by the inhabitants of the lower dorm as well as the upper since he was known to demonstrate compassion and treat them as actual people.
"And nobody else's work was damaged?" Alexis had become colder and colder as the tale had unrolled. Of all the drawers in the heavily extensive cabinet, only these eight had any signs of damage and they just happened to belong to the only eight remaining Slifer students on the island.
"Hardly a coincidence." Ziesmer was less perturbed but still sounded annoyed. Probably because he was wasting time listening to the petulant whines of a bunch of slackers. "Did the students mark the drawers in any way?"
"Not that I can see." Dr Sartyr had looked a bit closer than his senior colleague and failed to spot anything besides the crisp remains of each drawer number. Students were told not to label the drawers so that their rivals didn't pull pranks or interfere with the marking but each drawer was noted down as belonging to each student.
"It's impossible to tell but I think they could have been forced open." Each drawer had the same type of lock as the average filing cabinet. The drawers could easily be popped open with a spoon if you happened to know a dirty blonde with a delinquent past who could teach you those sorts of tricks. "Besides, my students had the only copy of the keys." A backup master key was kept by the academy but each drawer had only one key cut at a time. (Hashi lost his five times before the faculty wisely decided to reassign that responsibility to the staff.)
"How are they holding up?" Alexis didn't have to guess the answer. Nobody in a red coat was even angry at the lost art since they had universally hated their previous assignments. They were rightly furious that someone (or someones) had been cruel enough to try and burn their work for no reason except thinking they didn't measure up to some imaginary threshold.
"They put weeks into this work." He was careful not to mention the preliminary designs they had begun drawing up since. "And now they had nothing to show for it. Considering that Arla neglected to document their progre"
"I vote we assign them a passing grade." Ziesmer butted in unexpectedly. "Dr Sartyr, do you agree?"
"You want to give them an automatic pass?" Yugi couldn't help from blurting out.
"A compensated pass, yes." Dr Ziesmer gave him a sharp look. That inflection on 'you' had nearly drowned out the rest of the sentence. "Providing they have passing grades in their other subjects and accept completing this unit next year, on their own time. Any difference in marks can be backdated and assigned as they come."
"I agree with Dr Ziesmer." The bewhiskered head of Ra Yellow was as close to an independent adjudicator as there was on the island. Crowler would have torn off his ruffles if it meant agreeing with Yugi Mutou and Alexis had a vested interest in passing these children so she could set them on Jaden when he finally arrived to do his damn job. "They evidently had work of some level in progress, certainly enough to warrant this act of vandalism." He actually wiped a moist eye clear. "Assuming they are not indicated to be responsible, I see no reason they should be punished for this incident."
Hopeful mutterings across the room responded positively to the suggestion until Yugi turned his head just enough for them to see his face and the students magically remembered that they were hard at work and not listening in. "That's very kind of you." Perhaps he had misjudged Ziesmer. At least, beyond assuming that his disgust for the Slifer Reds was more than professional. "I appreciate your accommodating this incident."
"Since the Slifers have already started working on fresh designs," Lines were being drawn in the sand. Temporary yet immutable. Ziesmer and Sartyr were on one side and Alexis stood with Yugi on the other. "I believe their current work should be allowed to be taken into consideration towards next year. Better, I think a few of them could still complete their designs this year."
"Starting new designs this late would be reckless." Sartyr politely disagreed. "I'd advise the students to take the pass and continue next year. They can even recreate their lost designs if they choose." Without realising it, he was shifting to stand beside the blue coat.
"There's no need for that – I had them begin again when I first arrived." Yugi gestured to the far end of the storage cabinet. "Their new designs are still intact, not even heat damaged from the fire."
There it was. That flash of anger that couldn't be smothered quickly enough. "That's wonderful news." Dr Sartyr broke in with a cheerful smile. "Of course, any new work that has been completed will be allowed to carry over."
"Of course." Ziesmer agreed on cue. "I'm eager to see the results." Even if he was inwardly seething over the unlikely turn of luck. "Well, if there's nothing else, I have to get back to my own students."
"There is one last matter." Yugi couldn't be sure that Ziesmer was genuinely angry or merely irritated at his time being wasted. He was going to give a little nudge and see what happened. "My students and I were assaulted last night. Rocks were thrown at us on our way back to the dorm and my students and I sustained injuries."
"What?!" Sartyr was the most alarmed. "Who would stoop so low?" Alexis and Ziesmer knew the most likely suspects since staff members could overpower rock with paperwork. Ra Yellow existed in an uneasy middle ground. Most Yellows wouldn't raise issues with Reds in case they slipped down or Blue in case they managed to move up. Those that were foolish enough to try either mostly made enemies of the other Yellows trying not to get caught up in the power struggles.
"It was dark. We didn't see much." Nor did he mention that Steve had managed to return at least one rock to sender. "Since this must have happened since we left yesterday, we should consider that it's related. The timing's too coincidental otherwise." Ziesmer didn't so much as flinch.
"Student gym kits are all dark blue. It could have been anyone." Anger again but not the same as before. This was the normal type of anger that came with not being able to find the bad guy. "As far as I'm aware, my students were in the Obelisk Blue dorm last night but a few of them could have sneaked out. Dr Sartyr, Dr Rhodes?" That restrained anger fell back slightly as he turned to his colleagues. "Have you any thoughts?
"My students and I had a spirited debate on the essential elements of a heroic backstory last night." Sartyr was equal parts dorm leader and accomplice grandfather. He could turn any conversation into a teachable moment and any lesson into a fairy tale. "But I cannot imagine any of them could do such harm as to befell that young man back there."
One of the hardest parts of being an authority figure is having to hide your emotions. Being a teacher, that restriction extended even to rude words and eye rolls. "Hashi's bruise isn't a result of last night's attack." A huge purple mark coloured his forehead like a giant bullseye. It wouldn't have been so resplendent if he hadn't kept poking it to watch the bruise fade and reappear like a cheap magic trick. "We recently repaired the wardrobe in his room and he forgot it no longer gets stuck trying to open." A swift tug with no resistance had thrown him into the interior before he could figure out what was going on.
"Ask Dorothy if she can check him out." Alexis knew as well as the rest of the circle that a concussion would have shown signs by now. But there was something not quite right with Hashi's head as it was and a quick look never hurt anyone. "Besides that, I've only got two girls at the moment and they were working on a history essay last night. I'll check over their work next, make sure that they didn't skip out to set the fire."
"Or the stoning." Ziesmer was pulling his anger back under control now. "They could have done either." For an elitist, he had a remarkable streak of equality when it came time to assigning blame.
"Sakura tore an ACL when she broke her leg and Riko has partial damage to her rotator cuff." Which absolved the pair of the stoning since one couldn't have walked that far unaided and the other could barely use her dominant arm. "They were put on a modified schedule to allow them to pass the year cleanly." While the Slifers were being given compensated passes and resits, the wealthy donors behind Alexis' students wouldn't accept anything but a pristine record.
This realisation put Ziesmer in an uncomfortable position. "I'll have a word with my students." Probably a few extra words that wouldn't appear on the official transcript. "And I'll remind them that we don't use rocks to settle our disputes." His words indicated cards, his tone indicated fists. As he turned and walked away, Yugi caught a brief glance of his already clenched hand.
"Give your students my condolences." Dr Sartyr was an eye-twinkle away from being a magical grandfather to the entire island. "Let them know that I will be asking my own pupils if they have heard anything about either of these incidents." With a cheerful wave, he departed after his colleague.
"I cannot get a read on that guy." She knew that Yugi wasn't talking about the Ra Yellow leader. Ziesmer was presenting mixed enough messages to confuse anyone. Professionally trying to destroy the Slifer Reds was easy enough but there was no reason to burn their work and then personally vouch for their pass. Even the motive of trying to create the idea of fairness was moot since there were more effective and less risky options available.
"I'd have agreed with you if he hadn't asked to pass them." That had been a strange offer itself. Politically speaking, trying to punish any student for the arson would have been impossible but giving them the opportunity to work towards a higher grade instead of granting them a minimal pass was too generous for the group without connections. "I think that he's trying to keep you from prying too far into this. Any of his students get caught and he'll have no choice but to actually punish them."
"Good." Yugi didn't care that they had gone after the Slifer Dorm, he'd watched a group of young men huddle for cover from hails of rubble and the display of senseless violence sickened him. "I'll give them this one chance to stop. Otherwise, I'm going to keep looking until I find out who's responsible." Barely a few days into his journey and there was already so much going on that he'd nearly forgotten why he was there. Yliaster had a plan to kill Jaden, that much was certain, but the political infighting at Duel Academy was bad enough that it required his full attention.
As Yugi was breaking the good news to his students, another group of students was breaking bad news to their leader. Who was taking it as well as could be expected. "How stupid do you have to be?" Anger carried on that tone as readily as the dangers that came with answering recklessly. "You're lucky I managed to grab the hard drive last night because not only did you burn the wrong drawers, you had the fucking idiocy to go and throw rocks at them like a bunch of monkeys!"
"It wasn't our fault!" A cluster of shorter figures managed to resist the dark power flowing against them. "We hit the drawers you told us to. Nobody knew that they'd started again!"
"Alexis did." That hissed whisper raised unpleasant shivers. "And now she knows that something's going on. Since you managed to get all the Slifers Slackers at the same time, they know it's either the Yellows or the Blues and you've been going at them so often that it's no surprise you're all still hanging around." The realisation that they had done a perfect frame job on themselves stunned the assembled students.
Instinctively, one defaulted to the term which had always solved their problems before. "My father," A hearty slap cut short the rest of the sentence.
"Grow up." The attacker hissed as the group shrank back and realised that all the lawyers in the world were further away than the definitively more evil figure looming against them. "Your daddy can't do shit here. Best he could manage is convincing the Slackers to drop it and all that will do is prove you were involved." Fuck, this should have been so easy. Instead of being thrown out for failing the year, the Slifers were going to get an easy pass and sympathy from the rest of the faculty. He'd told them to smear the paintings and the idiots had burned them instead!
"What should we do now?" And here came the whining. Money could hire the best tutors but it couldn't buy brains at any price.
"We can't go after their work again." A miracle! Enough grey matter existed in one head to recognise the fallout of their last bout of free will. "They'll just keep being given passes. And the staff'll come after us if we try attacking them."
"Don't worry about it." Enough with the stick, they knew who was in charge now. It was time to use the carrot and lead them in the right direction. "Just find different ways of going about it."
"What else can we do?" It was so easy filling these heads with new ideas. They were bored and so certain of their dominance that they'd walk right into a burning building if they thought the people they hated would burn to death.
"If only there was a way we could put the Slifers in their place that left us untouchable." Give them a spade, they'd dig a pit. Give them a car, they'd drive it right through the front door. "Go after them in a way that nobody can even disagree with."
A bloodthirsty smile grew at the centre of the huddle. Rich kids were like early computers – lots of power, overbearingly expensive, and easy to control if you managed to convey the plan in excruciating detail. "I think that I can help you with that." Reaching into the pocket at one side drew all gazes towards the deathly items coming from within.
That was a close 'brush', eh? A real 'stroke' of bad luck? Try not to 'easel' up on those reviews!