[The Reward] [a Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez one-shot for AyaNara's contest]

There was an animal that stood in your yard and never left. You could see it move below in the darkness, white on black, catching the moonlight. It had been there for days now, ten days and ten nights, and it just stood and waited and watched.

You were beginning to think it wanted something. When it first arrived, you had just returned from school and were walking up the sidewalk and there, on the side lawn was the animal. It looked rather like a man, in fact, and not like an animal at all, and it was tall and had very muscular arms and a bare chest, and was definitely human-like. And then it had looked at you. Two eyes, cat-like and large, an unnatural, brilliant blue, stared back at you, or, rather into you, through your skin and in between your bones and past you entirely. It hurt. There was a pang in your chest like nervousness but a little too strong. You remembered wondering how you were going to get inside with it standing there, tracking you, but when you tentatively took the first steps and walked up the pathway it never moved. All the way up the path and up the stairs to the porch it just watched, and, when you opened the door and looked over at it, nothing changed. Nothing. There was a perfect stillness, and the pain in your chest was still there, and you quickly rushed inside and slammed the door shut.

You hadn't told anyone, mainly because you'd thought someone else might notice on their own, but nobody ever did. Your family walked by many times a day and never saw it. At first you thought maybe it wasn't actually there and your antidepressants were doing weird things to you. But it was so real, too real; when there was wind its hair moved and when there was rain it got wet. The animal was there, it was a thing, and at long last you realized only you could see it. There was a large, human-like animal on your side lawn and no one could see it but you.

It was hard to sleep. In the beginning everything was fine, because you thought it would get bored and leave. The next day it was still there, and the next and the next and the next. You gave up, eventually, on wishing it might leave on its own.

You sighed and pulled away from the glass, walking over to the bed and collapsing on it heavily. The bulb in your room never reached its full brightness and so everything was cast in a dim, warm light. You were exhausted, wanted to sleep so badly, and the lighting was pulling you down, and you couldn't. You had this odd fantasy that the moment you closed your eyes and fell into slumber, it would crawl right up the side of your house, crawl in your window and you'd wake up with it in your room. It was the most upsetting thought you'd ever experienced because you knew, somehow, it could happen. The sky doesn't rain fire, insects don't consume whole cities overnight, but that animal in your yard could get as close to you as it wanted if it tried. You knew this.

"________!" your mom called from downstairs. Your eyes snapped open and the world returned in a rush of color.

"Yeah?" you called back, propping yourself up on your elbows. Your head spun and that surrealistic world between awareness and unconsciousness wedged its way into your brain. You weren't even sure you were having a conversation right now.

"Dinner!" she replied and there were sounds of other conversation below.

You pushed yourself off the bed and stumbled down the hall and down the stairs to the dining room, falling into a chair at the table. Your mom surveyed you skeptically. "Tired?"

"Never not," you sighed, reaching for the closest bowl. She shook her head and sat down herself.

Through the window behind her head you could see eyes. Everything stopped. That feeling, the feeling of being hunted, was familiar but would never feel that way. The two blue points, glowing faintly in the dim light of the moon, started up that pain in your chest, that squeeze-and-release motion that made it hard to breathe.

You took a deep breath and looked at something else. Your mom was talking aimlessly about her idea to buy a farm, which was ridiculous, and you nodded every so often to make sure she thought you were listening.

All of your impulses said to look up. Every part of you, every part except that sliver of your brain that wasn't yet fried, wanted to see it. For a very long moment, you fought back and stared intently at your plate and then there was a knock at your door. In the resulting shock, you looked up and immediately your gaze went to the window.

It was there. You could see the eyes, now bigger, brighter, like electric blue spotlights. Something felt off.

They were bigger. It was closer.

You jumped up from your seat as your mom stood from hers to get the door. She opened it and you could hear the voice of your neighbor in the background. Your heart thudded in your chest wildly. It was closer. Much closer than it had been, because now, in staring at the eyes, you could see the pupils and even the whites. In fact, you could see the whole face and body, outlined faintly in the moonlight.

It was at moments like this, where fear prevented you from any other thoughts that didn't include the animal, that you wondered what it was. It was not human, and yet it was distinctly so. It had the feel of an animal, everything about it was animal, from the predatory nature to the unnatural stillness, though its chest rose and fell, but it had the eyes and form of a human. The most intensely beast-like eyes that were so familiar because they could have been anyone's had they not been so brilliant.

And that was why it was so unnerving. It looked as though someone had tried to combine animal and human forms. It felt off, unholy, and even more so because it was so real, so usual, so like any tall male human you'd ever seen, but it wasn't. You didn't know why, but it wasn't.

You realized your mom had returned to the table and the neighbor had left. She was sitting there and staring at you oddly. "________?" she said. "What are you doing?" She looked over her shoulder at the window and, of course, nothing was there so she turned back around and sighed. "That was just the neighbor, you know, asking about the noises."

You fell down into your chair and looked at her. "What noises?"

"I don't know. She said recently there has been a lot of commotion in the back woods, but I haven't heard anything. Probably an animal."

"Yeah, probably an animal..." You looked down at your plate and didn't feel hungry any more. "I'm done, I think."

"Really? Okay. Just bring your dish into the kitchen." She returned to her food and you grabbed your items and dumped them in the sink before running upstairs and shutting yourself into your room. Immediately, you rushed to your window and looked down. It was back on the side lawn where it had been previously.

You felt hollow and exhausted. Sleep consumed you, and you could do nothing else but prepare for bed. Before laying down, you pulled the shades over your window as though that might stop it from seeing you, but you knew it was useless and you were too tired to try harder. You got into bed and slept.

Moments later, the alarm went off. You opened your eyes with a snap and sat up in bed. Looking over at the clock revealed it was actually morning and not late at night. You shut your eyes and placed a hand over your chest to try and stop the rapid thumping of your frantic heart. None of the past days had been good for your cardiac health.

A quick peek out the window told you the animal was still there but that was not news. You sighed and moved to the bathroom to wash up. After dressing, you did a quick check-over of your backpack and went downstairs for food.

Your mom was in the living room drinking coffee on the couch. You put your bag by the door and shot a glance out the window. From this angle you could see the animal, standing casually in your yard, staring at you with that usual unreadable expression and hunger. You shuddered slightly and went to the kitchen to eat.

Morning and daylight hours were actually pretty exciting, and in a way you could not describe. At night, it was horrific, with its hulking shape and glittering eyes and dangerous presence--there was a constant sense of impending attack or of something awful. In light, though, it was much different. The animal remained imposing, but it was other things, too. It had blue hair the same color as its eyes, which you found confounding, and what looked to be the razor-sharp teeth and jawbone of some vicious creature attached to its face. And then there was the giant hole in its abdomen. You spent a lot of time wondering what in the hell that was and why it wasn't bleeding out on the ground or at least trying to hold its intestines in. None of this made sense and you had no answers or even beginnings of answers.

On the way out, you paused on the path and observed it warily. It first turned its eyes to you and then its head. You were aware of the ripple of muscle in its neck and the slight flexing and unfurling of its hands and the movement of its temples as it clenched its jaw. You could almost imagine the pulse in its throat.

In the early morning sun, its eyes were radiant and glittering. There was something odd there, a wash of mania just under the surface that send the whole image into a tailspin. You felt the pain in your chest and stumbled back from the force of it. Fear, like a stifling pall, was cast over you suddenly and it wasn't majestic or even interesting anymore, it was just terrifying.

The horror must have shown up on your face because, for a moment, it looked confused. Almost taken aback. You watched its expression change slightly, the set of its jaw shifting, the light in its eyes flickering. It turned toward you, actually turned, and you could see the vast expanse of its chest, all pale skin and muscle and that gaping black hole. Something very close to hunger seemed to explode through it, and for a long moment it looked ravenous, wild, and its mouth turned up into a wide, manic grin, baring sharp teeth.

You turned and ran.

School felt safe and placid the moment you stumbled into the entry. People stared at you as you bent over to collect your breath and you just thanked all the gods that ever existed that you hadn't gotten hit by a car on the way here.

"________?" your friend said, sidling up to you. "You okay, girl?"

"Yeah," you gasped. "Yeah, barely."

You spent most of your class time staring into space and pressing at your chest where a faint squeezing sensation still remained. At one point your friend leaned over and asked why you were groping your breasts. You had no idea what she was talking about until you noticed other people staring at you.

"Oh my god," you breathed, closing your eyes and letting your head loll back as the teacher prattled on about trigonometry in a slow monotone.

A loud, sharp screeching noise broke the quiet. It dragged on for a long few seconds, and people screamed, ducking beneath their desks and jumping from their chairs. When it stopped, you opened your eyes and stood back up from where you had been crouching behind your desk.

Claw marks were scratched down the tall windows. The noise had been the sound of glass giving way to sharp nails. You stared at them in silent shock and then your friend grabbed onto your arm very tightly.

"_________!" she squeaked, eyes watery and reddish. "What is that?"

You couldn't find words. There was just air and very little of it. You shook your head and tried to find it in yourself to form sounds, sentences, anything.

"I don't know," you finally whispered, voice shaky.

"Probably an animal," she replied.

You looked at her and she looked at you. Tears threatened to spill down her cheeks and all around you there were sounds of fear and confusion and awe. "Yeah," you replied, barely making a noise. "An animal."

Your class was moved elsewhere, down the hall, and the school called the police so they could come investigate the claw marks. Your peers were all in a panic and talking and restless and some of them were pretty excited about the possibility of a bear in the area for some reason, but something was dawning on you.

What if that had been the animal, your animal? What if, after you'd ran, it'd followed you? What if it was here, with all these people, hunting and prowling and taking things apart with its strong arms and claw-like hands? What if it was watching, right now?

You quickly glanced out the windows and saw nothing of the sort. Your heart rate wouldn't lower and you were getting clammy. Beside you, your friend was frantically texting her mom and on the verge of tears from the shock. You didn't feel like crying, but you felt boneless, floating in space, so consumed with the idea that it had followed you. It never followed you. You hadn't thought it ever moved.

"Don't worry," the teacher said, "we're dealing with it. They called animal control."

Of all things.

Class resumed and the subject switched. Now it was literature, and you were reading a particularly gruesome fairytale from Europe, when your friend leaned over and poked you. "________," she whispered, passing you her phone under the desks. You took it and looked at it hesitantly. It was a picture, a blurry photograph of a shape. Well, more than a shape. It was a blurry photograph of what appeared to be a large, white creature moving at very high speeds. Speeds so high, in fact, that you couldn't discern any details, let alone whether or not it had blue hair.

"What do you think it is?" you asked her quietly.

"It looks like a bear to me," she replied.

"A bear?" You looked at it again. It was white, distinctly so. "What kind of bear?"

"Grizzly, probably. They're huge and fast." She said this last word in a emphatic rush, and her eyes widened. You stared at her. Then you realized the two of you weren't looking at the same picture.

"Oh," you said after a moment. "Yeah, that makes sense." You felt your hands start to shake and you took a few deep, measured breaths to try and calm down. "Hopefully they catch it," you said with a wan smile, handing the phone back to her discreetly.

"Yeah," she breathed. "It could hurt somebody."

You nodded and looked down at your book. The next few hours were quiet and normal, you were very glad the rest of the day was passing without incident. You went to chemistry, you went to lunch, to history, and nothing happened. You found yourself glancing at the windows constantly to check for eyes, but there never were any and eventually you just stopped and spent most of your time with your eyes directed downwards.

You were outside for free time, sitting on the bench near the school garden with your friend, and she was chattering excitedly about her upcoming vacation. "It's going to be warm," she was saying, "and everything will be in bloom!"

"That sounds beautiful," you said.

People behind you were talking about the claw marks and one of them said, "They're just gonna shoot it down," and the other said, "I hope not. Wouldn't it be so cool if they put it in a zoo? It'd be huge!" You turned around in your seat to look at them but they didn't notice. A sort of anxiety welled in your stomach.

They couldn't put it in a zoo. It wasn't that kind of animal. It would do something awful, it would kill people who came to look at it. You knew, for some reason, that it would do that, that it would go crazy in a cage, and that, instead, it needed to go far, far away and back to wherever it came from, which was definitely not around where people lived. And they couldn't kill it. It wouldn't die. Yet again, for some reason you knew this, knew that it didn't work like that, that it might not even bleed, that the bullets might not even go through its skin. That it would just kill the people that tried to kill it.

You felt nauseated. Your friend looked over at you and made a sound of worry. "________! You okay? Do you want some water?" She handed you a bottle and you drank from it mechanically, and it made you feel a little better but not by much. "I'm sorry you're not feeling well," she said sadly.

"It's okay," you replied, trying to smile at her.

There was a pain in your chest again. You jumped and shut your eyes in discomfort. A loud crash, a sound as loud as thunder, but very close by, ripped through the air. Your friend screamed and so did some people around you.

You opened your eyes and your friend dragged you to your feet off the bench, and pulled you away from the sound. Looking over your shoulder, you could see dust and dirt billow upward in a giant cloud, revealing a gaping hole in the side of the building.

You stumbled to a stop. The hole was huge, probably at least 10 feet wide, and it looked as though something had plowed through it instead of just hit it. Your legs became so weak you had to sit down on the grass. Your friend dropped down beside you, hands gripping your arm shakily. "Oh my god," she gasped, eyes watery again. "Did... Did it do that?"

Sirens wailed in the distance. That was fast. You shrugged and buried your face in your hands. The pain in your chest was unbearable to the point you thought you might cry. The sounds of people running and talking and crying in shock surrounded you. An official-sounding voice told people to move out of the way so the officers could come through and investigate.

You looked up when something felt odd. Off in your peripheral vision there was a movement too high to be from someone on the ground. You glanced in that direction hesitantly.

The animal was sitting on the roof, its legs swinging off the side, leaning back on its hands looking incredibly relaxed. As you stared at it, it made eye contact with you. Its expression was serene, the cat eyes narrowed into satisfied slits, and all in all it looked very at peace with itself. The two of you watched each other for what felt like an hour, but was really more like two minutes. Then it smiled, grin showing sharp white teeth, and the smile was manic, was too wide to be normal, but the rest of it was calm. You were confused. The confusion turned to shock when it raised a hand and casually waved at you as though reminding you it was there, but of course you knew it was there, because there was a large, partly-naked human-looking animal with blue hair and a hole in its stomach on the roof of your school.

You stood compulsively. It raised an eyebrow and sat up straight, no longer lounging back on its arms. You had no idea what you were doing, or why you were doing it, and, really, you were barely thinking here, but you whispered under your breath, "Go away!" with all the pain and fear and shock you could muster.

You weren't expecting anything to happen. But it did. The animal looked genuinely surprised for a moment, its eyes widening and eyebrows raising. And then it laughed, actually laughed, loudly, but you knew no one could hear it but you. It laughed and then it smiled and it looked at you with those hungry, glowing blue eyes and its manic grin, and it said conversationally, "No thanks."

You convulsed with pain and bent over, wrapping your arms around yourself to try and control it. You wanted to scream, wanted to so badly, but then you just felt nauseated, genuinely, and you thought you might vomit right there on the grass. Tears didn't come and you hoped they would; there was no outlet for your pain and you wished there was.

Your friend was by your side and saying something frantically into your ear. Her hand was on your back, cold through your shirt. The tears finally did come and they rolled down your cheeks, boiling hot on your skin. You made a sobbing sound or something like it and your friend had moved away now, was calling for help, beckoning people over and someone said, "Where does it hurt?" in your ear and you wanted to show them, to open your chest up and take your heart out and show them. You couldn't do anything, though, couldn't even remove your arms from where they were wrapped around your waist like a vise. There was white noise that sounded like concerned yelling.

Then it stopped. It left you in a sudden rush, like an implosion. It just sank, the feeling, down into nowhere and you were left hollow. You felt light, cold; you were shivering, but there was nothing there now. Everything was empty.

You opened your eyes slowly, hot and blurred with tears. Carefully, you let your stomach go and crossed your arms as tightly as you could to keep the trembling to a minimum. You realized you were on your knees on the grass, curled over them, and that you were gasping for air as though you hadn't had any for centuries.

"How are you feeling?" a male voice said but you didn't want to look to see who it was. You shrugged and swallowed, tasting the sourness your mouth had taken on. A shiver wracked your body for a moment and then you just settled, feeling devoid of anything at all.

"School's ending now," someone said. "If she's feeling alright to move she can go home or to the clinic."

"It was probably the shock," another person said. "A lot of weird things happened at the school today."

"________?" your friend said softly near your ear. "Are you alright now?"

No words came to you. You nodded and rubbed your hands down your face to wipe off the tears. Gradually, you pushed yourself to your feet and stood very still, testing your balance. Around you, the police had brought in a dump-truck and bulldozer to clear out the rocky mess and it was all very loud and tense. "I'm okay now," you said in a small voice, "I'll just go home."

It took some more convincing, but eventually your friend's mom came and drove you home. On the way, you became exhausted, barely able to keep your eyes open, fading in and out of awareness. "You okay?" your friend asked and you just nodded slightly. She sighed sadly and continued explaining to her mom the events of the day.

As the car pulled up to your house, you scanned the area for the animal. It wasn't there. It took you a moment to realize this, and when you did you felt a disconcerting mixture of elation and worry. Where was it if it wasn't there?

Your friend walked you up the path and up the stairs to your room. She glanced at you in concern as you gingerly lay yourself on the bed with a deep sigh of relief. "_________," she mumbled. "Are you sure you'll be alright?"

You looked at her. "Yeah, I think it's okay." You tried to smile reassuringly. "Today just stressed me out, I guess..."

"Will anybody be home?"

You went to answer but then couldn't, and when you couldn't the fear rushed back again like a dam had broken. Your mom wouldn't be back until late evening, and your dad wasn't even in town. You were alone, and that wouldn't have been an issue, even if you were sick, except that you didn't know where the animal was. You might not be alone at home at all because it was still there.

"No," you said quickly. Panic seeped into your tone and you shoved it back, not wanting to freak her out. "No, nobody will be here."

"Do you want me to stay?"

"Yes. Yes, please." You lay back on the bed as she called her mom to let her know she was staying. You thanked her as many times as you could before she got flustered and asked you to stop. The two of you talked for a long while about school, about whatever, and it was good. You felt happy, free, with no pain and no fear, and you could laugh. It was such a relief you wanted to cry but she wouldn't understand so you didn't.

"________, has something been going on?" she asked later into the night. "You... always seem tired and distracted and... Is something going on?" She had folded her hands neatly in her lap and was twisting them nervously.

You sighed and closed your eyes. "No, it's fine. I'm fine. Really. Just a lot of stress lately."

She smiled and stood up. "Do you want to go to sleep now? It's already near nine and you need the rest..."

"Yeah, sure." She was like a mom, you thought. You reached into your side table drawer and fiddled around until you caught a hold of sleeping pills. Why you had these in there, you didn't know, but you did and that was good. She got you water and you took two.

"I'll just stay here until your mom gets home," she said. "Then I can have my mom pick me up."

"That sounds good," you said.

After a few minutes, the room was a blur and you lay down under your blankets. Sounds around you buzzed and hummed and you felt warm, very warm, but comfortable warm in your clothing. Your eyes fluttered shut and moments later you fell into a silent, charcoal sleep.

You were shaken back to consciousness what felt like moments later. Your mom gripped the sides of your arms so hard it was causing bruises, and when you opened your eyes in shock and looked up at her, her skin was sallow and grayish. "________," she whispered fiercely. Her expression contorted into devastation. "Something horrible happened..."

You didn't feel anything, just her freezing hands digging into your skin. "W-what?" you replied in a hushed tone, feeling the flutter begin.

Her eyes were wild but watery and dark. "Your friend and her mom... When they were leaving the house last night around ten-thirty, they were attacked." She hissed this last thing in a halting manner. "By an animal, some large animal. It killed them." She was crying now.

You watched her in complete stillness. "What?" you asked softly, pleadingly. "What happened? Mom... Mom, what did you say happened?" She didn't reply and you sat up in the bed. When she finally just shook her head, you felt the thud in your chest before the heat in your eyes. "A-are they out there right now? C-can I go see--"

"No," she hissed, "it's a mess, _________. Don't go down there." She wiped at her eyes and took a deep, slow breath. "I'm going back down," she said quietly. "The police are here and I need to speak with them." She leaned forward and gripped your upper arms, staring into your face fiercely with watery, shifting eyes. "_________, don't go down there." She rose from the bed and walked out of the room, mechanically shutting the door behind her.

Dead? She was dead? An animal?

Oh god.

Nausea hit you like a train. You curled over your legs and buried your face in your hands. The tears came instantaneously, rushing out in searing hot bursts and you could barely keep up with yourself. You felt the sobs leave your mouth rather than heard them; they tore out almost involuntarily, sending your lungs into shudders. This went on for what felt like hours.

Then you felt it. The odd sensation of being watched and you didn't even care at this point, was so distressed it didn't matter either way, so you let go of your face and looked up.

It was climbing in the window. Rather, it was currently in the room, having climbed in your window, which was wide open. It stood there with its naked chest and its strong arms and long fingers, and its brilliant blue cat eyes and the gaping hole in its stomach, and its wide, wolfish smile with sharp teeth. It was large, too tall, absolutely enormous in your small bedroom. It absently closed the window behind itself with a hand. You stared at it in mute shock.

The animal walked forward a bit and stood at the end of the bed, looking down at you. Tremors started in your body and you felt immediately ice-cold, and you kept staring into its radiant eyes and so you tore your gaze away from that, and you looked straight ahead and could see your bedroom wall through the hole in its stomach. The shaking was stronger now.

"Hello," it said smoothly, voice calm and predatory. You tried to open your mouth to say something but nothing came to mind and so you breathed your words out on a shaky breath. Its smile widened and so did its eyes, becoming large ovals, the black pupils contracting.

You found it in yourself to form words. "Go away," you managed, voice low and as forceful as you could manage, which wasn't much. Tears were there again.

The animal got on the bed and began crawling towards you, its large body jostling the mattress. "No, stop!" you hissed, feeling the anxiety simmer in your head. It climbed over you, surrounding you completely, on its hands and knees.

"No, I won't," it rumbled, grinning with bright white teeth and jagged canines. From this angle you could look down its body and see all the ripples and ridges of muscle in its chest, which moved with every breath. This was a creature built for battle and survival, clearly.

It pressed a hand down on the mattress beside your head and you squeaked in shock. It was surveying you with shifting eyes, and you felt helpless in its power. "Go away, please," you mumbled this time, feeling tears come to the surface. It watched you cry with a bizarre sort of curiosity, its eyes widening and becoming manic, its smile fading into something more like a snarl. There was a sheen of something in its eyes. You stared up into them and they stared back, endless and cold and fiery.

It slammed a hand down on the mattress on the other side of your head. You jumped and the crying intensified, and now you reached up with both hands to cover your face as you sobbed. It didn't do anything for a little while, just observed with its morbid curiosity, but then it gripped one of your wrists in its hand and yanked it away from your face, pinning it to the bed by your head. You squeaked in shock and tried to drag your hand from under his, but its grip was crushing, iron-like, its skin surprisingly warm, but maybe too warm.

It did the same with your other hand, pressing your body down into the mattress with the weight on your wrists. The tears were unstoppable, and you wanted to badly to cover yourself, to turn away, but you couldn't and it felt humiliating. It spent this time watching you sob with its wide, wide, interested eyes.

"Let go," you mumbled, trying to wrench your hand away again. You gasped up at it and you felt your face contort in devastation. "Let go!" you cried, closing your eyes and looking away from the animal's captivating eyes and expression of curiosity.

"Humans are so fragile," it said to you, very near your ear. You hadn't sensed it lower its head near yours. "I could break you," it said, grin coloring its tone.

You shuddered and tried to bite back a sob to no avail. "Leave me alone!" you pleaded. "Get off of me! Go away!" You didn't really think about it, you weren't thinking at all about anything actually, and so you brought your knee up as hard as you could into its upper stomach area.

The animal grunted in pain and it turned into a low growl. "Human," it said with a considerable amount of derision, the wolfish smile still in place. "Don't try and fight me."

"Get off of me," you hissed at it, tears blurring your vision. "You're heavy, get off of me."

It shook its head, blue hair shifting slightly. "I like where I am. I'll stay here."

Some sickening combination of fear and rage and helplessness melded in your stomach and you were suddenly a shaking, angry mess. "You killed my friend," you sobbed, kicking at it again repeatedly. It took the abuse without acknowledging it and gazed down at you with its wide, curious glittering eyes again.

"I did."

"Why?" You ignored your tears and made a frustrated, devastation screaming sound. "What is wrong with you? Why?"

It seemed honestly confused for a moment. Its expression was openly processing the information and then it narrowed its eyes and frowned deeply. "They were delaying me," it said, irritation clear in its voice.

"What does that even mean?" you sobbed. "Get off of me! Just go away!"

It rose up on its knees and was now just kneeling over your hips. It crossed its arms over its bare chest and looked down at you with an odd expression. "I wait around for over a fucking week and then I have to wait longer?" It snarled and you jumped in shock at the animalistic quality of the sound considering how human the voice was. "I don't like to wait," it said, narrowing its eyes at you.

You stared up at it in shock. "W-what do you even mean? W-what are you talking about...?"

It bared its fangs and growled low in its chest. "It doesn't need to fucking mean anything. I always get what I want--"

"What do you want?"

You were expecting it to say "you" but it didn't. In fact, it didn't say anything. It just stared at you with its radiant eyes and its slight frown and its furrowed brow. And then it shrugged casually and looked rather disinterested. "Doesn't matter. I always get what I want." It fell down on top of you again, pinning both of your hands over your head with a single one of its own. The weight knocked the air out of your lungs and you gasped at the sudden force.

"Get off of me," you whispered around the tears clogging your throat. This was too confusing.

"What's your name?" it demanded suddenly, loudly.

You blinked at it. "__________..."

It seemed satisfied with that response. "I'm Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez, the sexta espada," it said conversationally but with an odd amount of intensity. You didn't say anything, just stared up at it in frozen fear. It narrowed its eyes at you in thought. "You're mine."

"No!" you said compulsively, before you could stop yourself. Immediately you sucked a nervous breath in and tears pricked your eyes.

It didn't seem fazed. "You are. It's already been decided," it said flatly, blue eyes dark with some emotion. "I'll show you."

And it bit you. On the neck. It gripped your chin roughly with the one free hand and tilted it up, and then attacked the side of your neck with its teeth. You screamed upon contact and squeezed your eyes shut. You felt the pain, the digging, stinging pain, and the warmth of its mouth and its tongue and your blood all at once, all in an uncomfortable mixture. It stayed there, its sharp teeth sunken into your skin, for a long moment and then it pulled away. When you slowly reopened your eyes and managed to see past the blurry tears, the animal was licking its lips and making an odd sound low in its chest. A purring sound.

"See?"

"S-see what?" you whimpered, deathly confused and disoriented.

The animal ran its fingers through the blood on your neck. Before you had time to feel that discomfort, it licked the blood off and stared you dead in the eyes, its face contorting into an odd mixture of contentedness and insanity.

You felt cold and small. "I-I still don't see what you mean," you whispered, trying not to upset it further.

It looked perfectly pleased with itself. "You can't resist me," it intoned. "You're mine."

You opened your mouth to say something, you didn't know what, and it was suddenly hovering over you, its face mere inches from yours. At this proximity, you could see the lines creased into its skin from constant frowning, the concentric circles of many different shades of blue that made up its shocking irises and the wings if color at the corners of the eyes, the skin there as blue as its hair on its head. You could see the angry-looking teeth of the jawbone oddly attached to its face, bleached white and very real. You could feel the immense heat radiating off of it, too much heat, and then you felt nauseated again.

"You make me feel sick," you whispered fiercely, voice probably on the edge of pleading. Tears pricked your eyes as the feeling washed over you again. Out of the corners of your eyes, you could see the long, ropey muscles in its arms flex and ripple. "Get off  of me," you tried again, and this time you reached up to shove against its chest which was very low to your own.

The moment your skin made contact with its, a few things happened. First, an odd liquid heat shot through your arms and the energy seemed to drain out of them, suddenly, all at once, and you felt weak and limp. Then, you gasped loudly in surprise, which wouldn't have been a big deal, except your eyes automatically snapped to its, and it seemed to have been waiting for this. But it looked pleasantly surprised as well, and immediately it gripped one of your wrists and held it there when you tried to jerk away. This all took about five seconds.

The pain in your wrist now overwhelmed you. "Let go!" you squealed, bringing a knee up and catching it beneath the ribs. It grunted and snarled, its upper lip pulling back to reveal unnaturally sharp teeth.

"Stay still, human," it growled. "Stop struggling." Its eyes had narrowed into burning cobalt slits.

"You're hurting me," you gasped at it, knowing that anger had eclipsed some of the panic and now you probably looked irate, but you felt like jelly, wavering and helpless, and you just wanted to get out from under it. You could feel bruises forming where its hand was wrapped too tightly around your wrist. And where your hand was pressed to its naked chest, you could feel heat, only heat and the hard muscle that pushed in and out as it breathed.

It glanced at where it was holding you and seemed to consider something. Then it let go and said in a low, dangerous voice, "Keep your hand there."

The two of you stayed there for a long moment, you staring up at it, your hand still pressed to its chest, it staring down at you, evaluating, measuring, looking hungry. You wondered why no one had come up to see if you were okay. Were they still down there? Were they still alive? You wanted to ask the animal, but you noticed it had closed its eyes and seemed to be concentrating on something, its eyebrows furrowed deeply. You closed your mouth and tried to take deep breaths to drive back the panic and nausea and fear.

Its eyes snapped open suddenly, full of blue fire. Its mouth pulled up into a grin. "Perfect," it muttered, halfway growled, the sound starting in its chest, and rumbling through your hand and down your arm. You jumped at the sensation, which continued long after the word. You focused on the feeling against your hand, which you eventually realized was a low, low purr. It was purring. You had a moment of surreality and had to bite back a sound of surprise.

An arm suddenly slid under you, wrapped around your waist and lifted you. You were suddenly pressed to its chest, and it rose up, standing from the bed and walking over to the window, carrying your weight on one arm effortlessly. You tried to struggle but it was no use. "Put me down!" you hissed at it, hoisted over its shoulder, its hand pressed to your lower back.

It didn't seem to notice and opened the window with a hand, and, before you could register it, stepped out into the cold, black air; but you didn't plummet to the ground at all: there was a rush and you were suddenly moving very quickly, the wind whipping around you, trees and houses flying past and then you were very high. You didn't notice this until you felt weightless and the animal adjusted its hold on you until you found yourself staring up at it and realized it was carrying you princess style.

This was odd for you.

You made a shocked squealing noise and dug your hands into its shoulder and forearm so as to not topple and drop all several hundred feet to your death. It laughed, its eyes wide and glittering in the darkness. You felt your heart hammering against your chest, your skin busy with all the sensations--the iciness of the air, the intense heat of its body, the harsh biting of the wind, all of that made your head feel fuzzy and then you remembered it had bitten you and you were probably losing blood at some constant rate.

You compulsively touched the bite area and felt your fingers slide through something wet. You made a strangled sound of anguish and squeezed your eyes shut.

It was yelling at someone now. Its voice ripped across the silent night and was very loud near your head. It was saying something insulting, tone deep and displeased and animalistic, cut through with a vicious, bloodthirsty kind of threatening. You couldn't tell what it was saying, the wind being too loud, but you got a vague sense that it was giving direction, because white shapes shot past you and disappeared suddenly into nowhere.

"Fucking idiots," it scowled, voice very clear. It then seemed to remember you and grinned down at you, expression turning from crazed rage to some kind of predatory calmness. "But they won't be able to touch you, human, I wouldn't worry."

"I-I wasn't," you mumbled, trying to look nowhere but up so as to stem the nausea. The tears were gone now, replaced by a dry nothingness that was unbearable; instead, there was a panic that had settled very uncomfortably in your throat that made it hard to breathe. You took a very shallow, shaky breath in and shook your head at it. "C-can you please bring me back down?" you asked in the levelest voice you could manage, though it still shook horribly.

"No." It wasn't moving any more. It was just standing there, in the middle of the air, balancing on nothing, looking completely unconcerned. You were shaking and couldn't stop it. It tightened its hold on you by many times and you sucked in a breath at the pressure.

"I'm sick of not being recognized for my greatness," it began, voice deathly low and when you looked at its face it was contorted in the most uncontrollable rage you'd ever seen. "I'm better than them," it snarled. "I deserve more than what I have." It was at this point that the dangerous calmness left it and it let loose an immense, frustrated roar, its eyes dark and flashing with rage.

You cringed and covered your face with your hands until it stopped the horrible animal noise. You could feel it breathe heavily against you. "I'm the sexta espada!" it bit out viciously. "I'll kill them for underestimating me! I'm Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez, the sexta espada! Who the fuck are they?" It spat this, bit it out with sharp, bared teeth, staring off somewhere into the sky, focusing on that point with an insatiable rage.

You were terrified and your skin was cool and clammy. It might drop you. It might kill you right now, take you apart, and you had no idea why.

"Stop," you said softly, pleadingly, just wanting it to calm down so it wouldn't do anything bizarre. Its skin was dangerously hot under your own, and you worried it might suddenly pass out or fall unconscious and the two of you would plummet down. This thought hit you again, very hard in the head, and when it seemed to pull in another breath to screech something else, you pressed a hand to its chest and just said, "Shhhh..."

It was the only thing you could think of to do. Tears were on your cheeks. This was overwhelming. Whatever it was, it was overwhelming. You were so scared, so frozen that the only thing you could think of to do was to do the exact thing that might have calmed you down.

The thing was, it did calm down. Very suddenly it quieted, its chest heaving, its eyes glittering. It looked down at you, an odd expression on its face. You ran a hand down your face, trying to rub off the tears that were drying in the cool breeze.

It made a noise and you looked at it. "You're not leaving," it said decisively. "I'm keeping you."

"W-what?"

"I deserve this reward," it said with a dangerous smile, cat eyes narrowing. And then it stepped forward into a void of darkness and the two of you were gone.

:]|Unexpectedly|[: [a Zane Truesdale one-shot for MisszazahGXtruesdale]

You looked up just as someone dropped a glass off the balcony. It shattered against the marble floor, shards flying and flipping through the air. There was a scream of shock and Crowler blew up in a hissy fit. “Don’t do that!” he screeched. “Don’t you know the health inspectors are coming?”

Being on an island, the Duel Academy had its fair share of hazards. Not only was it difficult to evacuate, but the usually damp air was perfect for diseases and insects. You always had this image of opening up the stadium doors to see millions of crawling things. Though, while the school was a theoretical danger, it didn’t really experience many issues. There hadn’t been a mold outbreak, there hadn’t been an infestation of carpenter ants, and there hadn’t been a full-scale fire that required evacuating. It was okay.

But, anyway, the health inspectors were coming. You stepped back from the broken glass and wound your way through the mob of students who had stopped to see Crowler have an aneurysm. The hallways were nearly empty because most people where in class, but you had free time because you were in Obelisk.

You were what you called a “reluctant Obelisk.” Essentially, that meant that when it came down to testing you fell into the Obelisk category, but as a person you were not quite cut out for it. For example, you were a hella awkward duelist. Most people can get up in front of the school and snap on the duel disk and play some cards; you could do no such thing. Nor did you want to. Dueling was a pretty visceral experience, and a weird one at that—you had little interest in dealing with holograms, especially holograms that didn’t always stay holograms. 

Crowler’s shrill voice echoed down the corridor and you quickly dove into the study room and shut the sound-proof door behind you, albeit gently. The study room was reserved for Obelisk students only but no one really enforced that rule, so anyone could use it as long as they weren’t too obvious. It was perfectly square and filled with bookshelves and desks and armchairs and tables for group study. Though, to be honest, not much studying went on in there; it was kind of a quiet, social gathering place. 

You slunk to the back of the room and threw all of your stuff down next to an overstuffed chair. Nearby, a group of Ra students talked quietly at one of the tables. The lights were dimmer than usual and it was considerably calmer than it had been yesterday and earlier this week. It was kind of your hang-out spot. 

You fell heavily into the chair and kicked your school-issued boots off, tucking your feet under you. You had disgusting amounts of homework but didn’t want to do any of it, and so you snuggled into a corner of the chair and flipped aimlessly through some scientific journal lying on the coffee table beside you. 

Thirty minutes later, someone came to stand by your chair. “What are you reading?” they asked.

You glanced up to see a disgruntled-looking Chazz. He glared back and nodded at the book. “I don’t know,” you said, blinking up at him. “The human genome, I think.” You looked at the cover of the journal and nodded. 

Chazz half snorted, but seemed to control himself. “You can’t read the human genome, idiot,” he said under his breath. He looked about himself, seemingly for a chair, but decided against it, instead crossing his arms defensively over his black jacket front. “Why?”

“Why not?” You shut the book against your chest. Chazz rarely ever spoke to you. You thought you two had maybe one real conversation ever, but you’d recently been paired up in a practice duel that ended in a draw because Crowler had been rushed off to a meeting. You were suddenly afraid he was going to challenge you to a duel. You shut your eyes and prayed to every god you could think of that that wasn’t the case. 

Chazz raised an eyebrow. “No reason. Just curious. Are you going Saturday night?” It wasn’t really a question. Chazz’s voice was about as dead as the burger you’d eaten last night for dinner, and his entire expression was deadpan. He was the master of apathy, this boy.

“What’s Saturday night?” you asked tentatively, afraid you were missing something huge.

Chazz said nothing for a short while. “The end of semester dance,” he said finally. He didn’t even blink. You weren’t sure that was a good thing. 

“Oh. Oh!” you exclaimed in a whisper. “I forgot. Wow. Yeah, I’m going.” You set aside the journal and narrowed your eyes on middle space in thought. Chazz rolled his eyes and sighed in vexation.

“Are you going with someone?” he asked tiredly, uncrossing and recrossing his arms. 

You snapped your eyes up to look at him. “Oh my god, is it one of those dances? I am so bad at those kinds of dances…” You made a face and a small sobbing noise.

Chazz seemed to consider your sanity for a moment. “Yes, it’s one of those dances. So I guess you’re not going with anyone yet…” He sighed and looked up at the ceiling, tapping his foot softly on the carpeted floor. You watched Chazz be Chazz and strongly considered hiding beneath the chair as a way to save yourself from the judgment waves pouring off of him. 

He looked back down at you and blinked rapidly a few times as though trying to clear his mind. “Is there anyone you want to go with?” he asked in that sort-of way he sort of asked questions. 

You pursed your lips and leaned forward on your elbows. “Well, I haven’t thought about it.” You scrunched your nose up at him. “I suppose there’s someone I’d go with. I just haven’t thought of them yet.”

Chazz narrowed his already narrow eyes at you. “Well, when you think of that someone, let me know.” He dropped his arms and shoved them in his pockets, nodding tritely at you before turning and starting to walk away.

“Wait, Chazz!” you hissed in a stage whisper. He looked over his shoulder at you expectantly. “Are you saying you want to go with me?” you asked, tilting your head at him. Chazz stared at you briefly before closing his eyes and smiling smugly.

“Of course not, idiot,” he muttered, striding out of the study room and shutting the door a little too loudly behind him. You sighed and sunk back into the chair unceremoniously. The dance was another stupid thing to think about, and now that you thought about it, was a pretty damn big deal. You sighed and buried your face in your hands. 

You did some homework you didn’t want to do and tried comprehending the science journal you had been reading earlier to no avail. At some point, you put everything down and just stared at the ceiling.

The study room was warm and dim, and you looked at your watch to see that it was almost three. “Blah,” you breathed, curling into the chair as tight as you could go, trying to make time and school and everything go away for, like, ten minutes so you could nap.

Moments later, it seemed, you opened your eyes and sat up in the chair. Your head spun and you reached up to tame your unruly brown hair that was, generally, unruly by nature. You checked your watch to see that only two minutes had passed and slumped down in the seat as your heart rate slowed. 

“Excuse me,” a voice said, closer than you realized at first. You jumped in shock and looked around for a moment before looking over to your right at the nearest bookcase. A tall male Obelisk student stared at you, and you only kind of recognized the face.

You looked around, trying to figure out who he may have been speaking to. When you saw no one, you pointed at yourself and blinked rapidly. “Oh. Oh, me. Yeah?” You adjusted yourself so you weren’t a lump in the middle of the chair and tried to look at least sort of competent.

He stepped forward from the shadow of the bookcase and moved the books in his right hand to his left. “Are you still reading that?” He nodded at the journal lying open on the arm of the chair. As you watched him, he seemed to smile, but only with his eyes. “I noticed you were using it before…”

“Oh, no, I’m not. You can have it.” You closed it and handed it to him. He took the few steps closer and took it from you gently, adding it to his stack. “Sorry about that…”

“It’s fine,” he said, and you were beginning to recognize him, but not quite. You swore you’d seen this guy before. He wore an Obelisk uniform, a tight blue shirt under a blue jacket, and the usual school issued boots you’d seen a billion times. You squinted your eyes, trying to recall the name. 

 “Interested in the human genome?” you muttered to yourself. He must have heard it, because he looked up at you and did the eye-smile from before. The rest of his face was placid.

“Heart disease,” he said simply. You blinked blankly. “There are many articles in here.” He held up the book and waved it a bit in the air. You tried your hardest not to feel like a stupid blob. It only kind of worked.

“Oh. Sure,” you said, still lost in remembering the name. It was on the tip of your tongue…

He had begun to turn away, but you looked up just as he was turning back to you. “Are you Aila?” he asked. It sounded as though he already knew, to be honest.

“Uh, yeah.” You nodded slowly and unconsciously reached up to wrestle your hair into submission. 

“You are…?” You hoped he couldn’t tell you had no idea who he was. It was always uncomfortable when you’ve gone to school with someone for three years and never learned their name. Incredibly uncomfortable.

“Zane. Zane Truesdale,” he said, and you could see the ghost of an actual smile on his face. 

Something in you stopped but you couldn’t tell what. You widened your eyes only kind of, and acted as though you had known that all along, but you couldn’t tell if it worked. “Oh, hi,” you smiled at him and waved a little. The most bizarre feeling of absurdity came over you. Zane retained the tiny almost-smile and nodded at your wave, turning and walking over to a table a few chairs down from your chair. You watched as he sat down and arranged his books before him.

Of course. Zane Truesdale. You scrunched your nose up and fell back into the chair. You knew Zane Truesdale, technically. He was, like, the man of the school. You just never had immediate contact with him, and so you couldn’t have placed the name with the face no matter how hard you’d tried. Though, you could actually remember seeing him before in duels and classes, but it just never clicked. You sighed and wiped a hand down your face. Oh, Aila.

Three-thirty saw you still in your soft chair, taking notes on special summons from an enormous textbook balanced on your knees. The table of Ra students had dispersed and now there were just a handful of people in the study room, mainly Obelisk students. You threw your head back to look at the ceiling and blew air out of your mouth to disrupt the hair falling in your face. It just floated back down into your eyes. Your hair was long and wavy-curly—it couldn’t decide, apparently—and usually a mess. A hot mess, but a mess. You brushed it all over one shoulder and held it there.

The bell rang for late afternoon classes. You made an upset noise and slowly lifted the textbook off of yourself, closing it and setting it on the coffee table. The other students did similar things: snapping binders shut, rustling papers, stuffing bags. You put your notebook back in your pack and zipped it up, collecting your jacket over one arm. Class began at 3:45 and yours was only up the stairs, so there wasn’t a huge rush.

You glanced over at Zane to see him rising and stacking his books neatly by size. You sighed and walked out of the study room. In the hallway, you took out your phone and read an unread text from your mom asking about holiday break. You scrunched your nose up at the screen and decided to reply later. 

The study room door opened and closed behind you. Something moved in your peripheral vision and you turned toward the person. Zane was holding out the science journal. “Here,” he said, and his tone had something like amusement in it. “For your genome research.” 

You took it from him and caught the more-than-almost smile on his face as he turned away and walked off down the hall. You flipped the first page open and noticed a note stuck to the inside cover. Ref HG 1866-1923.C75, it said in crisp, all-caps handwriting. 

“Oh,” you said. “Oh, that’s real cute.” You shook your head and shoved the note in your pocket, tucking the journal under your arm and heading the opposite way down the corridor. 

“When the inspectors are here, there are to be no shenanigans!” Crowler cawed to the students. You rested your head on the desk and sighed. He was losing it. 

Chazz came walking into the class late like it wasn’t any big deal. Crowler didn’t even notice. You blinked as he sat right in front of you and turned in his seat halfway to stare at you curiously. 

“What?”

“You’re, like, twenty minutes late,” you whispered, pointing at your watch. He looked at it and shrugged. 

“Why do you care?” he asked, gazing at you unblinkingly with his almost-dead eyes. You scrunched your face up.

“I don’t, really…” You put your head back on the desk and let your mass of hair fall around your vision like a curtain. Crowler was talking about dorm searches, which you eventually registered and your head shot up.

“Starting tomorrow faculty will be going through the buildings and looking in rooms for any suspicious items that may or may not be a danger to other students.” He clasped his hands together in front of himself and sighed, bowing his head. “I know none of my well-behaved Obelisks will have any… upsetting paraphernalia, but it’s a necessary precaution.” He moved his hand as though to wipe away a tear. “We can’t have the health inspectors coming upon anything suspect.”

The class made a collective noise of distaste. You pouted and dropped your chin down on your arms. You hoped the searchers wouldn’t find your food stash.

Chazz turned halfway in his seat again and did that stare he did. “What?” you half-whispered, half-whined at him. “You’re been interacting a lot with me lately…”

He rolled his eyes. “You know,” he muttered, “most people wouldn’t complain.” He paused and looked at the ceiling briefly. “We need to continue our duel from a few days ago.”

Your heart dropped. “We need to?”

“Yes.” He narrowed his eyes slightly. “There wasn’t any closure. I need closure.” 

You made a face and backed away from his sort-of-manic glare. “But we totally can’t,” you protested slowly, evaluating his danger level. “Because I suck at dueling.”

You could’ve sworn you heard a growl. Chazz seemed to puff up a bit and his eyes darkened. “You do not, and we are dueling. No Obelisk sucks at dueling.”

“Well, I do.” You watched him watch you incredulously. “My cards are balls,” you said, quickly pulling out your deck. You flipped the top card and held it up in front of his face. The two of you looked at the strange fiery horse with the 700 ATK points. “Balls,” you reiterated.

“Balls,” he muttered back at you, nodding his head but giving you the most skeptical look you’d ever seen outside of a cartoon. He looked you up and down momentarily. “Well, think about it,” he said, voice kind of sulky. 

“Yeah, sure,” you mumbled. He nodded and turned back around in his seat. You slumped down and slapped your hands over your face. Crowler’s voice was white noise in the background. You weren’t bad at dueling. Your cards weren’t bad either. But, if you could make Chazz believe the duel would be a waste of time, maybe he wouldn’t bother you about it. Maybe. Probably not.

Thirty more minutes later and the bell rang for the next class. You looked toward the window at the back of the classroom. It was already getting dark—the sun sat low on the water, casting brilliant pink and orange beams against the dark purple sky. You sighed and moved to get your stuff.

Crowler was suddenly next to your desk. You looked up slowly and stared at his pale face for a moment. “Uh, yes, Mr. Cro—Dr. Crowler?” You picked up your bag and jacket and stood in front of him, tucking the science journal under your arm. “Is there something wrong?”

“No,” he said simply. You waited as he seemed to take a very deep breath. “That duel between you and Chazz from a few days ago was so rudely interrupted by that stupid meeting. It should be continued.”

Everything inside of you dropped endlessly. “Oh. Is that to get full credit, or…?”

“No, you already got the credit,” he said, waving his hand dismissively. “It’s for closure.”

You widened your eyes and nodded as though this were the first time you were hearing this. “Uh, yeah. That makes sense. When… When would this be happening?” You tucked your hair behind your ear and put on a very expectant face. 

He narrowed his eyes in thought and hummed. “Friday. At five-thirty. Right after last class and before dinner. It’s perfect,” he decided, apparently, and clapped his hands together. “In the arena.”

You didn’t think you’d be able to move even if you tried. “In the arena? The… arena arena?” When he nodded spastically you tried very hard not to sob. The main arena seated almost 1000 people, definitely the whole school population. Knowing Crowler, he was going to bring an audience. 

“Okay,” you breathed, steadying your voice. “That… sounds good.”

“Great. Now off you go.” He shooed you out of the class and shut the door behind you. You stood in the hallway and stared at passing students in silence for a minute. 

“Oh my god, shit!” you hissed to yourself. Chazz may have been this bizarre, enigmatic lunatic, but he was a very good duelist. You were a much more normal human being who probably ranked about 4.6 on the 1-10 Are You A Good Duelist? scale. Perfect. Your Friday was going to be wonderful.

You woke up the next day and praised the gods above it was only Thursday. First class for you didn’t start until nine, so you rolled, literally, out of bed and onto the floor, where you lay in a heap until you were hungry enough to get up. At eight, you were in the Obelisk dining room, sort of functioning and sort of knowing what you were doing. Students around you were walking by with heaped plates and drinks and you threw your stuff in the general direction of a chair and headed toward the food.

After acquiring your breakfast you took it back to the table and began eating at a sort of healthy pace. You picked up your juice just as a small group of second-year male Obelisk students sidled up to the table. “You, uh, Aila?” one of them—the head, clearly—asked.  

You took a long sip and looked at them over the top of your glass in confusion. “Yeah…”

The group made noises and the main guy grinned. “No way! You challenged Chazz Princeton to a duel for Friday, right?” 

As you stared blankly they all started talking to each other about stats and likelihoods and bets. 

“Right, yeah,” you said finally, setting down the glass and feeling the raging beast within crave the taste of Crowler flesh. However, that beast had your personality, so quickly chilled the hell out and left. You sighed deeply. 

“We’ll definitely be there,” the main guy was saying and exited with his group. You watched them go and tried to calm yourself by shoveling eggs into your mouth. 

At eight-thirty, you set your empty plate on the cart and slung your pack over one shoulder. You stood there for a moment and stared at your schedule, trying to figure out where to spend your free blocks. As you walked through the dining room toward the door, at least three other people acknowledged you had challenged Chazz to a duel. You tried to think of flowers and ponies.

Near the door, you waited for the mob to thin out so you could get through. “Aila,” a voice said casually, calmly over the noise of the crowd. You looked over to see Zane standing with a group of about five other third-year Obelisks you knew to be full of it. He didn’t look remotely fazed by how close they were standing to him, nor by how many girls were prowling the area with predatory, love-filled eyes. You wondered how he was even a human being, being so tolerant.

“… Hey,” you replied, expecting to see a bunch of people look at you. If anyone was, they were subtle about it. You were silently thankful.

Zane blinked at you languidly, expression cool and collected. “How is your genome research going?” he asked, completely serious.

You nodded. “Pretty well, actually,” you said, punctuating the sentence by widening your eyes. You saw the strange eye-smile he did but figured no one else did, because his face remained completely serene. 

“That’s good,” he said, nodding at you. “See you later.” He stared at you impassively and then looked off toward the windows. You wondered how someone could be so weird and yet so normal, and quickly exited the room.

The day was entirely uneventful except for that one part when a student tried tossing a potted plant from one side of the second floor to another student on the other side of the second floor across the foyer but failed, and it sailed to the ground and shattered into a giant smear of dirt and stems and ceramic pieces. Crowler had a conniption or something like it. You were there. It was funny.

You actually took your dinner to your room, where you ate the pasta Bolognese on your floor carefully while staring blankly at your spread out cards. Your best monster was this enormous black dragon with a gazillion ATK points, but you didn’t like summoning him because he was a serious dick. Your life was so difficult.

You collected your favorite cards together and put them at the top of your deck in any random order. Then you leant back against the bed and ate your spaghetti and inwardly sobbed. 

Someone came by and checked your room for “suspicious items” and you were fine because they didn’t find your giant bag of snacks. Score. You ate the rest of your dinner in relative joy.

At lunch the next day, Chazz hunted you down and cornered you in the empty art classroom. You braced yourself, afraid he was going to bite you or kiss you or something equally weird. But he just crossed his arms and stood there. “Our duel is this evening,” he said.

You gazed at him warily. “I know.”

Chazz narrowed his eyes as he did. “Just checking to make sure you knew…” He huffed a bit and sighed. “There will be people.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“So you get pumped,” he said, almost shouted. “This is a serious duel. A duel between two third-year Obelisks is big news.”

“Great. So I have an idea. You do your thing and I’ll lose on purpose. That way, you get what you want and I don’t have to try too hard and die. It makes sense.” You paused, evaluating his state. “It’s not that I’m so bad I don’t think I’d win, it’s that I don’t care as much as you do, clearly. Well, I care. But not too much, so…”

Chazz had the most disbelieving look on his face. “You… you don’t care? No!” He stamped his foot and swore. “No, you have to care! I care! You should care! You’re an Obelisk, so you should care! Stop talking like that! I want a serious duel!”

“Already this duel is kind of a joke, right? I didn’t actually challenge you.”

“Whatever.” He wiped his mouth and glared at you. “Let’s be serious about this.” He stopped and walked over to the desk, picking up a pencil and flipping it around in his hands. After a minute he put it down and walked back over to you. “You’re a girl, right?”

You stared at him and looked around in confusion. “Yeah…?” You crossed your arms defensively over your chest, trying to block the obvious boobs. He didn’t seem to notice or care. 

“Right. So already people will think I’m going to win. You’re not too well-known and I’m popular—ˮ

“You also talk a lot,” you deadpanned, gesturing toward him.

Chazz gave you a flat stare. “Yeah. Right.”

So the duel happened. Crowler was like a helicopter-mom, shouting praise and kind-of-advice to one or the other of you two. You succeeded in ignoring him, but Chazz spent the entire duel looking extremely tense, but you couldn’t tell what that was about. The crowd of 200 or so students was very loud and you could see Obelisks out of your peripheral vision clamoring closer to the raised platform. You had an increasingly horrible headache.

You didn’t totally throw it. In fact, you didn’t at all. It just didn’t seem fun that way. At one point, when you had 2300 LP and he had 2700, you looked over to see him staring at you intently. “Decide one way or the other,” he had muttered blandly. You thought it may have been a compliment. 

You lost, in the end. But, really, he had 150 LP at that point, so it was as if neither of you won. You didn’t care too much, and were pretty pleased with yourself for not having a nervous breakdown in front of that huge crowd. Crowler was pleased just because both of you did well, and Chazz was not pleased at all but in something like shellshock. After winning, he walked across the stage toward you and just stood there for a moment, eyes very dark and very flat, and then sighed very deeply from somewhere inside of himself and congratulated you in monotone.

“You are so weird,” you said, grabbing his hand and shaking it. He looked at you and his expression slowly changed from nothing to confusion. “I’m hungry,” you said, and left.

You thought that would be the end since you had lost, but it wasn’t. In the dining room people approached you and said things like “Great duel, Aila!” and “Wow, didn’t know you had it in you!” which wasn’t really a compliment. You just wanted to eat your steak. Duels took a lot out of you.

At around 6:45, you were sitting alone at the table in front of your empty dinner plate. You were watching the sun set on the horizon, all pink and orange and red, when a female voice called your name from very close by. You snapped your head up to see a pretty blond girl in a third-year Obelisk uniform. She smiled. “Hi,” she said, “I’m Alexis Rhodes. You don’t know me I don’t think.”

“Uh, no, I don’t.” You tried to think why you should. “I’m Aila, but you seem to already know that…”

“Yes. I saw your duel.” She paused and smiled again. You felt a little pressured to say something but she continued before you could. “You were very good.”

“I lost,” you informed her, as though maybe she hadn’t actually been there but only thought she had. 

“Maybe,” she said. “But you were still very good.”

“Chazz was better.”

“Not really. He may have just pulled better cards.” She tilted her head when you blinked at her blankly. “He was really struggling. That says something.”

You took a deep breath. “Thanks. I don’t… I don’t duel much, so I was kind of winging it…”

“Don’t duel much?” She mouthed the word “wow” to herself and widened her eyes. You smiled at her in semi-confusion and nodded a little. “That’s very cool,” she said. “I’ve never met an Obelisk who wasn’t obsessed with dueling, I don’t think.”

You were trying to figure out if she was serious or not. You thought she may have been. “Well, we’re hard to come by,” you replied. She smiled again, said bye, and left. You sighed and thought about how your graduating class was so different from you, you sometimes thought maybe you were in the wrong year. You supposed she had been nice; you just didn’t really fit in with the dueling elite in this place. 

To drive that point home, Zane was suddenly at your table. He apparently had floated in at some point, or poofed in like a ninja, or materialized out of nothing because he was not there and then he was. You jumped, you were so shocked to see him. “Oh, hi,” you said. “How’s your heart disease research going?”

You could see that he began to smile but stopped himself. “Well, thank you,” he said calmly. He was looking bizarrely put-together in his suit pants and button-up shirt. It took you a moment to realize he wasn’t wearing his Obelisk uniform. You blinked as the thought hit you.

Before you could say anything, he broke his silence and tilted his head to the side slightly. “I saw your duel with Chazz Princeton.”

Great. You nodded and folded your hands together tightly on your lap. “How was that for you?”

“Interesting. He’s a very aggressive duelist.” Zane spoke as though he had done serious research on Chazz and was reporting his findings. “You put up quite a fight.”

“I try.” You were starting to feel highly uncomfortable. He was looking down at you very intently, though his expression remained serene. You realized just how tall he was—very—as he stood there, looking very with it and knowledgeable and imposing. You figured this was why he was such a big deal.

“I wasn’t expecting that,” he said in a voice much softer than before. You looked up to see him evaluating you with a look. You scrunched your nose up.

“Ah, thank you?” You sat up straighter in your chair. “The genome research really helped.”

Zane smiled suddenly. Actually smiled. And he shifted his weight to his right hip and folded his arms and gazed down at you with that smile and said, “You’re funny” in this very calm, very amused tone.

That thing inside of you that had stopped before stopped again now. You choked on your intake of breath and had to try again. Around a cough, you found it in yourself to smile. “Uh, thanks, I guess. You’re pretty funny, too.”

Then he chuckled and you thought maybe the world was ending. “I haven’t heard that one,” he said, still with the smile. You felt a little overwhelmed. He looked at his watch suddenly and frowned. “I have to go. Bye, Aila.” And he nodded at you and did a little wave and was gone. You were very confused.

“Well,” you muttered to yourself, “that’s… that’s nice.” 

You stood in front of your full-length mirror and looked yourself up and down. In your baggy sweatpants and tank top you did not look too fabulous and you tried to remember if you ever had been. You tossed a look at the bed, where various dresses lay in a heap. Most of them were too casual and one of them was this white behemoth that looked oddly like a wedding gown. You were too much of a hot mess for dances.

You gathered your mass of hair and piled it on top of your head in a bun. Now with your giant ball of hair and your slumpy outfit and cartilage piercings showing you looked a bit like the weird caricature of a Slifer your friend had drawn at the beginning of the year on the whiteboard in the Obelisk common room. A little slummy, she might say. Your friend was kind of strange. 

You fell face-down onto the bed and sighed into the sheets. The only semi-appropriate dresses you owned were bandage dresses which were way sexy, and those weren’t too classy. Anyway, you felt gross from all the crap you’d been eating lately, and felt you wouldn’t look too hot in them.

“Being a girl is stupid,” you moaned and kicked at the air a bit. There was a knock at the door and you twitched, glancing around at the mess your dorm was in. Sighing, you pushed yourself off the bed and walked over to open the door.

“Hello!” a teacher you did not recognize said cheerfully. “I’m here for the dorm check.” You stepped aside as she entered and looked around the hexagonal room. After, poking her head in the closet and asking for you to open desk and clothing drawers for her to observe the contents of, she smiled and went back to the door. “Thank you! Have a nice evening.”

You watched her walk off down the hallway and shut the door quietly. “Why?” you sighed unhappily, walking over and falling onto the bed again. 

Your phone buzzed. Your mom wanted to talk about vacation again. You always wondered why it mattered. It wasn’t as though your family had money; on the scale of richest and poorest students in the school you were probably smack dab in the middle. And so every vacation you’d just take the boat back to the mainland, get on a commercial airline and fly yourself home, where you’d sit around with your family and sometimes your friends and talk and eat. Not that it bothered you. It didn’t. But you always wondered why your mother made such a huge deal out of it. It was the same every time.

You rolled off the bed and plopped into a pile of clothes on the floor. Staring up at the ceiling, you could see the bizarre paint patterns from where the brushwork went in different directions and the red squares of light above the windows where the sunset seeped in from behind the shades. You stuck your tongue out at nothing and imagined serpentine dragons coiling in through the window panes, bright turquoise and orange with long manes and ivory claws, two of them, writhing up the walls and turning in circles on your ceiling until they were intertwined and it was hard to discern where one ended and the other began. 

You sighed. Struggling to roll onto your stomach in the tangle of clothes, you reached under your bed and pulled out a thick, oversized hardbound book with a glossy cover. It was last year’s yearbook. You lazily opened to a random page and kept flipping until you reached your year. It was near the end, after the photographs of all the first-years participating in classes and clubs and duels and such.

There was a three-page spread of many 3-inch-by-two-inch photographs of the students in their school uniforms. Only head and shoulder shots, but the vast array of facial expressions made all the blue seem far less dull. 

You ran your finger down the page and then onto the next until you found Zane. To be honest, he looked exactly the same and hadn’t changed one bit physically, but his eyes were vastly different. You had this weird notion that Obelisks best emoted through their eyes—at least, if Chazz was any indication, as he seemed to push all of his frustration and confusion and everything out through his eyes, which were always glittering black like an angry cat with an arched back. 

You held your face close to the page and peered at the small rectangle that was Zane Truesdale. His eyes were somewhat narrowed and somewhere else entirely, definitely not in the studio, looking very piercing and absent. You wrinkled your nose and noticed that his eyes and his hair were very similar in color. You sighed again and shut the book, sliding it back under your bed with the one from first-year. 

Dragging yourself to your knees and then to your feet, and surveyed the dresses once again and began putting them back on their hangers. You wondered if they’d let you attend in casual dress. Probably not.

Dances at the academy were weird things. They included all three houses and usually took place in the high-ceilinged, glass-walled room that was the main ballroom in the Obelisk male dormitories. It looked out over the forest and the ocean beyond and opened out onto a terrace which in turn opened out into the lake.  It was way too fancy, you thought.

They were also very formal, usually. You recalled the first dance of the year in the first week of school and how it was a very tuxedo and gown kind of affair. It stressed you out. 

“Aila!” a voice called from the door. You opened it and your friend Loren stared back at you from behind glasses. She grinned and reached out to grab your face in her hands and roughly kiss your cheek. Then she was in your room, sitting on your mess of a bed, pulling off her heeled boots.

“Hello, friend,” you said, blinking at her get-up. Loren, finishing her shoe removal, jumped up and displayed her outfit. Loren was a model and very tall, with long curly blond hair and honey-colored eyes, and no chest and no hips and these ridiculously long legs. Now she was wearing a tight cranberry dress that only came up to her upper thigh. 

“What do you think?” she asked with all seriousness, turning a slow circle for you. 

You tilted your head and considered. “This is for tomorrow?” She nodded and turned again, pulling her long hair up into a ponytail with her hand so you could see the lace-up back. You hummed and she turned back around. 

“So? Is it too sexy? It’s too sexy.”

“Well… Not really. You could wear tights.”

“I can’t wear tights,” she whined, dropping her hair and crossing her arms. “I can’t. They give me static.”

You made a face and shrugged. “Yeah, then it’s probably too sexy.”

Loren made a noise of utmost frustration. “Okay,” she said, taking a deep breath. “I have this pale fuchsia mermaid gown—ˮ

“That sounds good. Wear that.” You thought briefly about asking to borrow one of her dresses but then remembered that she was a good head taller than you. 

Loren came behind you and hugged you around your waist enthusiastically. “You’re the best, Aila, baby,” she cooed, overwhelming you with floral perfume. You held your breath subtly and nodded. She suddenly reached up and grabbed your boobs. You squeaked and flailed at her aimlessly. She bounded out of the way and crouched down behind the head of the bed fruitlessly. You stalked over to her and folded your arms. “You look great,” she said, staring up at you from her seated position. “I like the ‘I’m not giving a fuck’ look.”

You pouted and flung yourself onto the bed face-first. Loren unfolded and flung herself onto the bed, too. “What’s wrong?” she asked in her baby voice.

You looked out at her from under your hands. “I don’t have a dress or a date for the stupid fucking dance,” you groaned. “And I don’t even care. Should I care? I don’t care.” You paused and sat up suddenly. “Who are you going with?”

Loren beamed. “A boy from Ra.” She blinked languidly. “He’s a good kisser.”

You deadpanned. “Great. I’m happy for you.” You huffed and crossed your arms. “I’m almost eighteen, why can’t I just skip the dance and leave for vacation early? It seems ridiculous…”

Loren adjusted her glasses dramatically. “You cannot leave Duel Academy campus for holiday vacation until the end of semester dance concludes.”

“They just don’t want to have to send more than one boat back to Japan,” you muttered, narrowing your eyes on what you imagined to be the administration. You slapped your hands over your face and made a loud noise of upset. “It’s so gross, Loren. I’m so bad at dances!”

“No, you’re not,” she told you. “You have nice tits.” You stared at her and she shrugged. “It’s a thing that matters.”

You sighed and picked up your cell phone just as your mother texted again about vacation. You replied and tossed the device toward the end of the bed. “You have to bring a date, anyway,” you said, frowning. “I don’t have a date even if I have a raunchy dress.”

“How raunchy?”

“Raunchy.”

“Damn,” she whistled. “There isn’t anyone you want to go with? ‘Cause I have a list of, like, twenty eligible guys.” 

“Thanks but no thanks, dear.” You rested your chin in your hand and reached up to toy with one of your piercings. “I don’t even want to go,” you finally whined, slumping forward and folding yourself in half. Loren patted your giant bun of hair and clicked her tongue.

“You don’t have to go, baby.” She narrowed her eyes at you thoughtfully. “That’s not weird.”

Saturday was on the colder side. The sky was a gray-blue smear and the water was appropriately dark gray and very still. You stared out your window and grumbled at the weather. Behind you, the door opened and a teacher poked their head in to remind you to get your things together “if you plan to leave for vacation.” You were reminded that some students did not leave the island, and instead stayed in the dorms for the two-and-a-half weeks everyone else was gone. So sad, you thought, that they were stuck here for whatever reasons they were. 

“Thanks,” you said and the teacher shut the door. You untangled yourself from your blankets and set to work pulling your suitcase from the closet and stuffing it full of clean clothes. Outside in the hall, you could hear excited voices and footsteps pound past as groups of girls ran down the corridor to the dining hall or wherever. You looked up at the ceiling in exasperation and wondered why your life wasn’t so interesting. 

But it was. You dueled Chazz and you hadn’t died, so that was a plus. Zane Truesdale was a thing. Or something like that. Whatever. You quickly put a bra on to protect yourself from the thin material of your shirt and dragged tight jeans that were too tight over your bare legs. “They must fit!” you hissed to yourself, struggling to button them. When you succeeded, you stared at yourself in the mirror and observed the way your hair was a bush. “Ah, you little bitch,” you mumbled, gathering it into a giant bun on top of your head and tying it there. You shoved shoes on and half-walked, half-ran out of the room.

Down in the dining hall, people were everywhere, all talking at an unnecessary decibel level. You rolled your eyes and pushed your way through until you could reach the tables with the food. Loren was there, in her usual loose tank-top and tight skirt. She whipped around to look at you, her long hair bouncing with the movement. “Aila!” she squealed, but you were right there so it was a little too much. 

“Friend,” you greeted her. She grinned and kissed you on the cheek.

“I’m going over to the Ra dorms after this. Come?” She grabbed at a roll before another student could take it. You casually piled tons of food onto your plate.

“Uh, yeah,” you replied, filling your cup with orange juice. “Why is this?”

Loren dragged you away from the food and toward the tables, where she fell into a chair and set her things before her. After daintily arranging herself and shoving half the roll into her mouth to chew and swallow, she looked up at you from behind her glasses. “To meet my man, obviously.”

“Ah, yes, the man.” You ate your food and then it was suddenly over—you were done and she was done and the two of you stood up and got rid of your plates, and you got to wondering why the days moved so fast.

Outside, Loren pulled you along the path toward the Ra dorms. People in yellow uniforms passed you by, some giving confused looks as to why two non-uniformed Obelisks were going in the other direction. You sighed and let it all happen.

Once at the dorms, she marched up the steps and into the building, whose doors opened into a cafeteria-like place filled with long tables. Loren scooted along the wall until she reached the end of a table where about five guys sat. She tapped one on the shoulder and he jumped, looking over his shoulder to see who it was, and then standing up suddenly in something between embarrassment and excitement.

“Aila,” Loren said with flourish. “This is Caleb.”

The boy smiled at you bashfully and you took a moment to observe. He was short, about your height and definitely shorter than Loren, and had a shock of spiky light brown hair and two very bright, very honey-colored eyes. “Hi,” he said in a small, friendly voice.

You melted. “Hey,” you said, smiling back so he didn’t feel so intimidated by your previously blank expression. 

Loren beamed and wrapped an arm around your shoulder to whisper very softly in your ear, “Isn’t he cute? He’s cute.” You just nodded and Caleb, who had no idea what she was saying, blushed and looked at the ground. You melted again.

“I should go,” you told her, poking her on the nose. “But have fun.” You waved at both of them and quickly escaped. The cool mid-morning air hit you and you rushed down the path toward the warm buildings as fast as you could. 

Back in your dorm, you stared around the room and dug through your books to see if there was anything you’d want to bring back to the mainland with you. You found, sandwiched between a special summons textbook and an art sketchpad, the scientific journal. Picking it up, you turned it over in your hands and flipped open the front cover to read the call number Zane had written on the sticky note. His handwriting looked like a font. 

You crinkled your nose in thought and closed the small book, tucking it under your arm. You looked toward the small fish tank on your desk and observed that your singular blue fish was swimming in lazy circles around a piece of fake kelp. Such a smart little fishy.

“Hello, baby,” you cooed at it, leaning down so you were eye-level with the tank. The little creature swam up to the glass and stared at you blankly with yellow gem eyes. You sighed and stood up. “I need to find you a home for vacation,” you muttered to the fish. Digging through the bin of pet items on the floor, you found a tiny travel tank and scooped the confused blue fish and some tank water into it. “There you go, baby,” you said, setting it down on the desk where the little animal floated there for a moment in disorientation and then began exploring its 5’x5’x5’ home. 

You dragged your suitcase to the door and lovingly arranged the rest of your stuff that wouldn’t fit in the bag in a giant pile in the middle of the room. With the journal still under your arm, you gently plucked up the small travel tank and headed out of the room and down the hall. 

In the main foyer, people were chatting and trying to maneuver around suitcases. You always wondered why nobody seemed to notice the girls-dorms-vs-boys-dorms rule, as both sexes wandered in and out of both dorms. Sometimes, most people ate in the boys’ dining hall and sometimes they ate in the girls’ dining hall. The school might as well have had unisex dorms. 

You picked your way through the crowd, careful not to spill any water, and finally made it out of the building and into the cold sunshine. A girl you recognized from art class stopped you on your way to the quad and shot a short look at your little upset blue fish. “Where are you going?” she asked with a smile. She was a nice girl.

“To return this book to the study room,” you replied, nodding to the item tucked under your arm.

“Are you going to get ready for the dance soon?” she said. “A bunch of girls are doing each others’ hair and makeup soon in the common room.”

“Sounds good. I may come by later if I have time,” you told her. She walked off after a brief goodbye and you felt bad about lying. You looked down at your fish and he seemed to give you a reproachful look. “Stop it,” you hissed at him. 

Few students were on the path that wound back behind the main building to a different entrance. You didn’t usually take this route but the front was so busy that it was really the only safe option. 

Sunlight filtered through the overhead trees, creating a dappled ground. The water in the tank swayed slightly as you made your way down the trail, the blue fish darting from wall to wall as though checking out the scenery. You turned a corner and stopped short. Zane was standing off to the side, looking down at his cell-phone, the expression on his face tense. You frowned and strongly considered turning back around so as not to disrupt this obviously important moment. You pivoted on your heel and peered down into the fishbowl for some semblance of intelligent help from the fish. He just floated there and stared around with his oversized yellow eyes. You sighed in frustration.

“Aila?” a voice said. You snapped your head up in shock to see Zane looking at you, the tense expression gone and replaced with calm nothing. He tilted his head and his eyes smiled. You felt something inside of you drop forever.

“Uh, hey,” you said. You didn’t move. Zane seemed only semi-real, and you were afraid that if you made any sudden movements or noise, he’d unfold wings and disappear in a flurry of blue feathers and wind. 

He didn’t really move either at first, so the two of you stared at each other for a moment until he sighed and shoved his cell-phone in his pants pocket. “How are you?” he asked leisurely, tilting his head.

You pursed your lips at your fish briefly. “I’m doing alright. How are you?”

“I’m doing well, thank you,” he said, almost murmured, and you felt much watched. Just as you managed to pull yourself together and up out of your pit of confusion, he caught sight of the journal tucked under your arm. The most out-of-place smile suddenly appeared on his face. “Ah,” he muttered, advancing toward you calmly and stopping a few feet away. “You still have the journal. Are you returning it?” At your wary nod, he tilted his head again and looked down at you with very cat-like, observant eyes. “Can I see it?” He extended his hand and you handed him the thin volume, which he immediately began flipping through. 

You were keenly aware that you were being hunted, or some approximation of it. He was feline—which was odd, really, because usually you found him very bird-like—and seemingly at ease in this weird area of the forest path near the back of the school. You took a moment to observe that his shoulders were still tensed and a dark glitter was settled far back in his gaze. Maybe you should run, you thought.

Zane looked at you and lowered the book. “It’s very good,” he said, gesturing to it. You weren’t sure he was expecting a response, so you stuck with an affirmative noise and a nod of the head. He accepted that and looked back down at its white and red cover. “What part did you enjoy most?”

Right, like you had been reading it. Though, his question sounded far more amused than it did judgmental. You looked up at him and he was staring right back at you. Oh. “I don’t know,” you sighed. “Fibrinogen. That stuff.” It was the first thing that came to mind and you were almost sure you hadn’t pronounced it correctly. You were horrible.

He looked genuinely surprised. “You read the other studies?”

“Kind of. In passing.” You shrugged. “I didn’t absorb too much though, so don’t quiz me.” You unconsciously reached up and patted your large bun of hair. Zane chuckled suddenly and you almost dropped your fish.

“I won’t,” he said, “don’t worry.” He handed the book back to you and his eyes fell curiously on your tank. 

“Oh,” you said. “This is Tamale. He hates everyone.” You held the little tank up higher so there was better visibility. He gazed down into the water where Tamale swam in jerky circles. “He eats flakes and loves the color blue because he’s so full of himself. Also, he hates the vacuum because it makes his water vibrate.” You made eye-contact with Zane, who was giving you a very amused look. “He’s a difficult fish.”

“Seems like it,” Zane said.

This was surreal. “Well,” you said after a moment of silence, “I’ll go now. I have to return this and get a sitter.” You blinked at him and he blinked back expectantly. “Uh, see you later, maybe. Bye.” You nodded at him and smiled, walking around him and down the rest of the path.

“Aila!” he called, but didn’t really; you may have just been listening too hard. You struggled between whipping around instantaneously as though expecting his call and acting confused. You did neither. You hesitantly looked over your shoulder at him.  Zane gazed coolly at you from the relative shade of the trees, his eyes especially sharp and intense in the off lighting. 

“Yeah?” you asked, feeling highly uncomfortable in the silence.

He half-smiled, the action forming a smirk, and chuckled a bit before answering. “See you later, maybe.” 

You knew he was making fun of your awkward goodbye, but it didn’t really matter because then he waved at you and gave you this look that conveyed something like, “Definitely later,” and turned back around, and you just stood there with Tamale and felt strangely hit-on. “Oh,” you muttered, and went off down your path.

The main hall was pretty damn crowded. You slunk along the wall and quietly made your way to the smaller side hall that led to the study room. A group of Ra students talking in intense whispers passed you by and a few of them stared at you in that peculiar, specific way Ra and Slifer students stared at third-year Obelisks. You gave them a small smile and they looked shocked. Turning the corner brought you to a thick knot of loud Slifers, all in brilliant red and toting a mixture of suitcases, duffle bags and backpacks. You peered at the throng closely and figured there was no way around it—you’d have to go through. You looked at Tamale who looked right back and gave you the most flat-out irritated expression you’d ever seen on a creature that wasn’t Chazz. 

You sighed and then there was a commotion. “Out of the way!” a voice barked loudly, and the group of muttering, grumbling Slifers parted to allow a bristling Chazz Princeton through. Look at that.

The two of you looked at each other and the group fell silent. You were confused until you realized that they had seen the two of you duel and were rapt in watching the two rivals face-off in person. Oh god. “Hey,” you said finally, feeling your bun of hair bounce as you nodded at him.

Chazz’s eyes were especially dead and black. He glanced you up and down and then peered at your fish critically. “Hello, Aila,” he said flatly.

“I see you’re in a good mood,” you said, smiling widely as he blinked blankly at you. He rolled his eyes and crossed his arms with a quiet huff. “Excited for the end of semester?” you asked.

“Not really,” he bit out under his breath, face darkening. His whole aura clouded and you could almost see wisps of smoke rise from his form.

“Why?”

He seemed surprised by the question and took a moment to answer. He measured you with a look. “Because my family is full of shit,” he said in a tone somewhere between hateful and resigned. Then he seemed to collect himself and frowned. “Why do you care?”

You shrugged. “You just looked upset. Is the study room open?” He nodded slowly and you smiled. 

“Well, I gotta go. Sorry about your family being so difficult. Try to have a nice vacation, Chazz.”

You moved to pass him and he stopped you by stepping in front of your path. You looked at him in confusion while the group of Slifers fell under a tense, watchful spell. “Something wrong?” you said.

“Just because you almost beat me in a duel doesn’t mean you need to be so nice,” he said, his characteristically flat black eyes boring into your face. “I don’t need pity from you, Aila.”

You sighed and consulted your fish with a look. “Listen, Chazz,” you began, setting your free hand on his shoulder. Chazz immediately froze and stared at your extended arm suspiciously. “I don’t pity you. You beat me. You just said so. I don’t care that you won.” At that, he gave you a piercing look and you cut off the words rising in his throat. “And by that, I mean that I’m glad you won, because I don’t care about dueling and winning and that stuff. So don’t think that am holding some sort of… bitter grudge against you, because even though I “almost” beat you, I didn’t, and so you shouldn’t think that I am laying in wait to kill you or something because I don’t care.”

Chazz’s deadpan expression didn’t change, but his frown deepened. “You should care,” he reminded you. Then he sighed and rolled his eyes. “Fine, you don’t pity me. Whatever. Just don’t ever think that we won’t duel again. I will beat you definitively next time.”

“Right. Cool.”

Chazz narrowed his eyes at you. “You’d better believe it.”

“I do.” You smiled at him and removed your hand from his shoulder. “Are you going to the dance?”

He seemed genuinely surprised. “… Yeah, why?” His eyes spoke of a deep, deep skepticism toward your honest intentions. 

“Just make sure you have fun. You, like, never smile, so you should do that. Being unhappy is bad for your health. I read about it.” You gestured with your head to the journal tucked under your arm. “Do that?”

Silence. He blinked at you blankly and all traces of anger disappeared from his face, replaced with complete confusion. “I’ll try that,” he said after a while, tone somber and resigned. “Have a nice day, Aila.”

“Have a nice day, Chazz!” You walked around him and through the parted group of Slifer students.

 There was a stretch of quiet as you left and then there was commotion again and Chazz yelled, “Get the hell out of here, you slackers!” and they quieted down into excited whispers. 

You walked as quickly as you could away from the scene and rounded yet another corner. Your heart rate slowed only slightly. Talking to Chazz was one of the most stressful things in the world, you figured. He was just so… intense. You shuddered and then spent a moment trying to keep Tamale’s water from spilling. 

The study room was calm and silent as you slipped inside. Winding your way to the back, you set the journal on the coffee table with the others. Tamale’s tank made a little gurgling noise and you looked down to see him blowing bubbles near the surface of the water. “I feel ya, baby,” you cooed to him.

You needed to find someone to watch your fish for the holiday. Tamale was a beta and he only needed to eat once a week, but still, he was fussy and would most surely be happier with clean water and someone to stare at from beside his kelp. “You aren’t gonna die, friend,” you told him with assurance. “I’ll get you someone.” Tamale gave you no indication he cared.

Back in the hallway, you stared around and tried to think. Some people you knew walked by and they asked whether or not you were getting ready for the dance soon. Blah. You said maybe to all of them and tried to keep the conversation to a minimum. People made you feel pressure to be interesting.

You made your way to the main corridor and immediately caught sight of Caleb. He was standing with his back to you, talking with some other Ra students. You glanced around to see if Loren was nearby. She was not. “Caleb,” you called, coming up behind him. He turned in confusion and, when he caught sight of you, smiled and reached up to tug at his short hair nervously.

“Oh, hello, Aila,” he said shyly, face reddening as his friends looked on in awe. 

Melting. “Are you going away for vacation? Or are you staying?” Ra students had a tendency to stay over holidays and he didn’t appear too affluent—Loren would have said something—so the likelihood of him staying was pretty high. 

“I’m staying” he replied, blinking at you with his wide, innocent eyes. He smiled and when you smiled back his turned shaky and he looked at the floor. “May I ask why?” he said, still examining the tiles.

“Uh, yeah. I’m going away and I have a pet I need watched. He’s really easy. He just needs to be fed once a week and have some of his water switched out a few times. Would you be willing to hold onto him until I get back?” You held Tamale out and Caleb raised his head to stare at the blue fish.

“O-of course,” he said, beginning to glow. You tried to keep it together as he beamed at you. “I’d love to help!”

“Great, thanks!” You handed him the small tank and he took it carefully, gazing down into the water where Tamale floated sullenly, waving his tail and drifting in lazy circles. “I’ll get the food to you somehow. It’s just flakes. It’s whatever. Thank you so much, really.” 

You were worried for a moment considering how red he turned. “A-ah, yeah. Y-you’re welcome,” he mumbled, smiling in embarrassment. You thanked him again and walked off, leaving a flustered Caleb with his excited friends.

Part of you felt bad for pulling rank there, but he was a good choice not only because he may have been an angel on earth but because he would be too worried about upsetting a third-year Obelisk to fuck anything up. You sighed. You were awful, sometimes.

On impulse, you turned back around and called his name. "Caleb!"

 

He jumped and stared around wildly for the voice before catching sight of you. You half-waved at him and said, "I owe you one! Really! And don't let him die, okay?" And just because you were feeling crazy from talking to both Zane Truesdale and Chazz Princeton in one day, you sort of, kind of blew him a kiss. 

He almost dropped the fish but didn't, thank god. Caleb was redder than humanly possible and seemed awfully flustered. "O-okay," he squeaked, and returned the wave much more shyly.

You were enjoying this too much. You winked at him and a girl with a pink dress on and curled blond hair stepped into your vision.

"Hey," she said, her voice a little too sweet-sounding for her apparent age. "You should stick to your own kind, and not bother Caleb." She almost spat the last words, and you could feel possessiveness pour off her in waves. You noticed out of the corner of your eyes that clusters of Ra students had formed close by and were watching intently. It dawned on you that this girl may be the Chazz of the Ra students. If so, this was insane.

You looked her up and down, eyes resting her hands, clenched into white-knuckled fists at her sides. You scrunched your face up and sighed, giving her a sad look.

"You need to turn it all the way down," you told her. 

There was a tense silence as her eyes widened dramatically and then the other Ra students collapsed into fervent whispers, and you heard one boy say, a little too loudly, "Oh, shit, she got told off by an Obelisk!" and the rest of the group gasped almost in unison.

The girl made a facial expression you couldn't decipher. "You think, just because you're an Obelisk, that—ˮ

"I don't think anything," you cut her off, holding up a hand. You tried to give her an understanding smile. "I was talking to a friend. I'm allowed to have friends in other social groups."

This day was an actual mess.

The girl opened her mouth and said something that sounded almost exactly like "You’re a bitch!" but you couldn't be too sure because the words were interrupted by another voice. 

"No, I'm not," you said before you could stop yourself. All of you wanted to slap a hand over your mouth for continuing the conversation, but you didn't, you just gazed at her levelly and raised an eyebrow. "I'm not a bitch for wanting to talk with someone I know, and I'm definitely not a bitch for standing up to you. So, no, I'm not a bitch." You took a step closer to her and from this angle you could see how her jaw was clenched tightly and her blue eyes had become watery but defiant. "So, please, do not call me one," you finished, "if at all possible. Thank you. Have a nice day."

At that, you turned and walked off, leaving the girl standing there in her pink dress, with her clenched fists and jaw and her hair nicely curled for the dance. You knew she would cry, because you would have, but you wanted to get out of there so badly you didn't even consider being sympathetic, at least not for now.

"Oh my god!" you gasped into your hands, once you had made it safely around a few corners and found yourself in the empty space between two staircases. You lifted the bottom hem of your shirt to your mouth and hyperventilated into it. Tears pricked your eyes and you cursed at yourself for being so emotional. 

Adrenaline from being so forward pounded through you, but all it did right now was make it hard to breathe around the lump in your throat. "Jesus," you muttered, wiping at your eyes with your shirt.

You took ten minutes to calm down and then slipped out of the crevice between the staircases. The halls had calmed down and now only scattered clumps of people stood around, some of them already dressed for the dance. You saw a girl walk by in a yellow mermaid gown and high heels. You wondered why dances were even held in the first place.

You slowly made your way back to the front foyer and came upon Crowler, who immediately pinned you with a look and marched over. "Aila!" he said/screeched. "I need to speak with you!" You nodded slowly and smiled at him. Crowler paused and brushed his jacket front off before continuing. "I have some fantastic news," he gushed, beady eyes widening. "I have entered you in a contest."

No. "A what?" you asked, blinking at him. 

"A contest," he replied, making an odd hand gesture reminiscent of cat kneading the air. "I thought about your duel with Chazz and realized that you have some serious potential. So I made note of you to a friend of mine, and he and I agreed that you will be our female representative for the International Youth Dueling Tournament this spring. The one held in Germany." He stared down at you expectantly. 

You opened and closed your mouth a few times. "Oh," you finally managed. "And I will have to... duel?"

"Of course!" he exclaimed, throwing his hands up. "You will be the face of our school! You will be an inspiration for female duelists everywhere!" He sighed contentedly and crossed his arms. "We will win it all, I know it. No way can we fail."

Your stomach seemingly dropped out of your body entirely. "Well, I don't know about that..." You smiled at him nervously and he didn't seem to notice your unease. "Who's the male duelist? There's two of us, right? I'm not dueling alone, right?"

"Obviously not!" he scoffed. "No, you will be dueling with Zane!" At your blank facial expression, he smiled very cat-like and nodded. "I assume you know Mr. Truesdale, both of you being of superior dueling rank," Crowler purred, and you felt a little weird watching him preen to himself. "Not to be confused with the younger Truesdale brother, no, not him, he's horrendous. There's nothing to worry about. Now, I have to go speak with the health inspectors concerning the school's state." He made a face. "Don't think much on it, Aila. We won't start training until after break."

"Of course," you muttered, smiling at him as he sauntered away. A scream steadily rose in your throat. You glanced at the wall clock and decided that the best option for your health and perhaps everyone else's would be to go back to the dorm and roll around on the bed in misery. You rushed out of the front doors as quickly as possible and ran wildly across the quad and down the path to the Obelisk dormitories.

Your rug was awfully interesting. You had been staring down at it, having lay face-down on your bed with your head and arms hanging off. The carpet was maroon and pretty soft, but if you focused real hard and didn't acknowledge it was a rug in the first place, it kind of looked like red sand. You patted it with your palm, and it was definitely not sand. 

You had spent the past few hours alternately breathing deeply into your bedspread and sitting with your forehead pressed against the cool window glass. 

Don't think much on it, Aila. 

"Oh no!" you moaned, kicking the bed uselessly. "No no no no no." You shook your head and your large bun bounced. It was already three o' clock and the dance began at six thirty. You weren't going, you had decided with enough finality to matter about forty-five minutes ago, but you still peered angrily at your closet of unwearable dresses. It wasn't their fault. "Sorry," you told the door. 

Your cell phone rang by your ear and you answered it blindly. "Yeah?"

"Hey, baby girl!"

"Hey, friend."

There was momentary silence as Loren thought. "You're upset about something. What is it? You know you can tell me, baby."

You groaned and looked sadly at your closet door. "I'm dueling in the spring international tournament."

Loren laughed. "What? Oh. Since when?"

"Since ten this morning. Crowler let me know. I'm gonna throw up."

"No, you're not. Don't be silly. You're going to kick ass."

"Don't even." You rubbed your forehead and squeezed your eyes shut. 

Loren sighed and hummed a bit. "Well, that's shit, girl. I mean, you dueled damn fine with that Chazz kid, but, I mean, you're kind of a hot mess. Not that that changes anything, but anyone with eyes can see that you're not feeling the dueling part of dueling."

"Thanks."

"De nada."

You sighed. "I don't know why he didn't choose someone definitely good. I'm hit-or-miss at best." You flopped back on the pillows. "My day is crap, Loren."

"I heard you put some bitch in her place today. Good girl."

"Oh, Jesus. Who told you that? That wasn't meant to happen. I'm not a bad person. I don't do things like that."

She laughed. "The whole Ra student body is talking about it. That girl was, like, the shit, and she's all embarrassed now. Great, because she was all up on my man."

"I only told her to not call me a bitch."

"You made her feel humble, girl. You made her feel ashamed of being so obnoxious. That's good stuff, sister."

"No, it's not," you whined, slapping a hand over your eyes. "Now people are going to hate me."

"No! No they will not! No way! You're the queen, girl. Feel good." She paused. "I have to go, sorry. Some people want to start getting ready for the dance and apparently I'm the only one who knows how to French braid, so..."

"Poor baby."

"Shut up. I love you." She hanged up and you tossed the phone away from you. 

"Why?" you asked the ceiling. It didn't say anything particularly useful back. You flopped back on the blankets and almost instantaneously fell asleep. Upon waking up four hours later, you were astounded at your efficient sleeping skills. “Damn girl,” you said to yourself, stretching groggily across the bed and yawning. 

The room had darkened and was now cast in orange light from the sunset beyond the windows. You checked the digital clock next to the bed. Almost seven. The thought that there was something meaningful and possibly fun going on somewhere close to you made you crinkle your nose up in frustration. Whatever. You didn’t do well with dances. 

You swung your legs over the edge of the bed and caught sight of your deck sitting quietly on the floor near your shoes. You had a bizarre urge to stomp on them but then thought about how they had feelings and it wasn’t really their fault you were such a mess. The next bizarre thought you had was that they deserved a hug for putting up with you. “Jesus, Aila,” you breathed, rolling your eyes and huffing. The dorm supervisors came by later to pick up the bags on large carts, and you set to stuffing the pile of things you didn’t need to bring but didn’t want to have all over the place into the closet unceremoniously until you could find a better place after vacation. Wow, you were especially bad today.

You made a sobbing noise and reached into a secret bag and pulled out a snack bag of cookies. Tonight seemed more and more to be a night of wallowing, and, goddamn it, if you wanted to eat as well then why shouldn’t you be able to? No immediate rebuttal popped to mind and you opened the pack, pulling out a cookie and devouring it. Slipping your shoes on, you grabbed a sweatshirt and walked off down the hall with your food.

The foyer was empty and your footsteps echoed off the high glass ceiling. Looking up, you could see the wash of colored sky above your head, all reds and purples and oranges. Wispy black clouds drifted along and everything seemed like a painted canvas had been thrown over the building, it was so bright. You moved forward and pushed open the doors with a shoulder, stepping out into the cool evening air. Cooler than you thought it might be. You hissed and quickly donned your sweatshirt. 

The quad was quiet as you shuffled across it toward the dock, which was the only place you thought to go where it wouldn’t matter you were alone. It occurred to you that other people must not be going to the dance, but the effort of finding them was too much and you were not really up for that. You sighed and continued toward the water, eating cookies all the way there. The campus facilities crew had helpfully placed trash cans every thirty feet or so—and it was necessary; this student body was stupidly messy—and so, seven minutes later, you tossed your empty snack bag into a can and stepped onto the dock. 

The dock was long and was actually part of a much larger harbor that stretched further out into the bay. The part people spent time on was a giant cement slab built into the side of the island that hanged out over the water but did not actually touch it; the water line came up to about five inches below the bottom of the slab. Steps went from this part down to the part where boats actually docked. All things considered, the dock was a pretty secluded area that was essentially on the water, and that was fine by you.

You made your way onto the giant piece of cement and to the edge that faced the water. The bay stretched out before you in a shimmering panorama of shifting color. You sighed and wondered why other parts of your day couldn’t be nearly as spectacular. 

“Well, would you look at this,” a voice said. You jumped so suddenly you almost toppled into the water below. Spinning to your right, you caught sight of the speaker and almost died. 

Zane looked very relaxed in his black suit pants and crisp, black collared shirt. The fact that he wasn’t wearing any blue confused you for a moment. He blinked down at you and smiled languidly. 

“Seemed you had the same idea as I did…” His voice was on the verge of conversational.

You had no idea what the hell was going on. “You didn’t go to the dance?” you asked, because that was the only coherent thing that came to mind. He shook his head and you pursed your lips. The weird predator-like watchfulness vibe you had got from him earlier was on in full force, and you couldn’t tell if it was because he could sense your nervousness or if you were just insane. Also, maybe he was just into intently staring at people he only had known for three days. Probably not. 

“Can I ask why not?” you said slowly, trying to convey your confusion tonally. This guy was, like, the most sought-after man in the school, literally any girl would want to go to a dance with him, and he was standing out on a fucking dock at seven in the evening in the cold. 

Zane seemed to absorb your train of thought and gave you what were essentially a smile and a raise of an eyebrow. He looked like a goddamn model standing there giving you that look in his fancy clothes. “I don’t like dances much,” he said in a low voice, kind of under his breath, like it was a secret he was letting you in on. You blinked blankly at him and he slid his hands into his pants pockets. “May I ask why you aren’t at the dance?”It dawned on you that the weirdness you were sensing in his voice was playfulness. He was being playful. Zane Truesdale was being playful with you on a dock at seven in the evening in the cold and you had no fucking idea why. 

“I’m bad at dances,” you said bluntly and you swore his eyes glittered in mirth. 

He shrugged and looked over his shoulder briefly in the direction of the Obelisk boys’ dormitory where the dance was happening. Then he looked back down at you. “Out of all the possible things you could be bad at, that seems like an okay one,” he stated, still smiling. “You could be bad at social interaction or tactfulness.”

You weren’t expecting him to be so intellectual on a goddamn dock at seven in the evening in the cold and so you took a moment to respond. “I guess so. But, still, it’s something it would be good to be good at, right?”

Zane looked so amused and pleased by that answer you couldn’t figure out of you should feel offended. “I’d have to agree,” he said after a moment of just observing you. 

“If you’re not going to the dance, why are you dressed up, then?” you asked because that was the only thing that came to mind next and because it was nagging you. He was way too dapper right now, and it was making you uncomfortable. But you supposed he must go through his whole life looking like that.

“I don’t think I’ve ever had a class with you,” he said thoughtfully. You just stared up into his eyes as he stared right back, not even caring that you knew he had changed the subject. He needed to stop smiling. It was flustering you.

“No, we haven’t,” you replied. 

“It’s a shame,” he muttered, really more to himself and outward toward the sunset. You blinked rapidly a few times and leaned toward him, trying to figure out if he had actually said that or if you were dying.

“Why?” you asked incredulously. “Why would that be a shame?”

Zane looked down at you from the corner of his eyes. “You’re pretty interesting.” It was said in the manner one might call a piece of art particularly noteworthy, or the way one might refer to an especially amusing movie. You toyed with the thought that maybe Zane was a psychopath and that would explain the bizarre ‘I’m being hunted’ sensation you got when around him. Or maybe not and you were just disoriented because Zane fucking Truesdale was complimenting you on a dock at seven in the evening in the cold.

You opened and closed your mouth a few times wordlessly. Before you could get any less attractive you placed a hand over your mouth and breathed deeply for a moment. Zane had turned back to face you and when you looked up at him, he was only about two feet away and you had a heart attack.

“You okay?” he asked softly, looking way too amused. 

You narrowed your eyes at him and nodded. “Yes, thank you,” you managed. You sighed deeply and reached up to poke at your giant bun. “I’m not that much of a mess, but thanks for your concern.”

Zane chuckled. “That’s good.” He glanced toward the water for a moment, and, before you could say anything, said, “You are a very good duelist” very seriously and with the most peculiar expression.

Oh god. “But not really,” you informed him. “There are some flukes, but I’m usually pretty basic.” You used all of your mental power to push comprehension waves toward him so he’d just get it, agree and drop the subject. 

It was to no avail. “I disagree,” he said. “I think you’re quite good.”

“That’s relative, though.”

“Not really.” He seemed adamant about this. His eyes were a little too intense as he stared down at you and leaned forward a little. “As an unbiased source, I think you’re very respectable as a duelist.”

An unbiased source? “But what does ‘respectable’ mean? Obviously I’d do well against someone who’s genuinely bad, but I’m not genuinely good on the other end.” 

“Why aren’t you good?” At your confused expression, Zane quickly reiterated. “What makes you think you aren’t any good? There’s nothing to say that.”

“But there is. I lose all the time.”

“That doesn’t mean you aren’t good.”

“It does at this school. Losing isn’t really a relative measure. Losing is losing.”

“Losing a duel doesn’t make you bad. It just makes the other person better. There’s nothing wrong with having other people around who are better than you—ˮ

“But what would you know about that?” 

The moment you said it, you experienced a few trains of thought: the first was that maybe this was some kind of sensitive topic because why wouldn’t it be?—he was stupidly good at dueling after all—and it definitely made it hard for him to connect with other students, the second was that you had just kind of insulted him, but maybe not really, it was hard to tell, and the third was that he probably already knew that. How could he go to this school and not notice that being too good meant that he couldn’t relate to 99% of what the other students went through? He was smart enough to know that.

You opened your mouth to apologize and maybe throw yourself casually into the water in distress, but Zane held up a hand and shook his head for you to stop. 

“I’m sorry,” he said somewhat stiffly, looking anywhere but you and then directly down into your eyes with a fiery intensity that scared you for a moment. “We don’t have to talk about dueling. Sometimes I forget people don’t enjoy it as much as I do.”

You didn’t really know what to do with this information. You didn’t think he needed to apologize, even if he was pushing the topic. What was even going on here? 

“N-no, it’s okay. That’s fine. I mean… I mean if you like talking about it, we can, if that’s where this conversation is going…” You shrugged helplessly and scrunched your nose up. 

Now he looked a little confused. There was a stretch of silence, and then he laughed. Like, actually laughed. Not even like the laughs from before that you thought were real. He laughed and you could actually sense something like happiness and relief in it, and it made you want to laugh, too. You didn’t though, because you were also extremely mystified.

“No, no, that’s alright,” he said around a smile, seeming to try and catch his breath. “Let’s talk about something else. Talking about dueling is very boring, actually.”

“Oh, okay,” you said, still trying to sort your thoughts. 

Zane had regained his composure and his usual calmness appeared again. “What do you want to talk about?” he asked, blinking at you languidly.

You forgot how to speak for a moment. “Um, I don’t know. Oh! The tournament,” you said, making a face. “I guess that’s kind of like talking about dueling, but not really…”

At mention of the tournament, Zane smiled knowingly and nodded. “Crowler must have told you then. It was a surprise to me, too.” When you looked confused, he shrugged. “He’s never pursued it before. I know about the tournament—I’ve meet contestants. But the Duel Academy has never really cared before now.”

“Great.” You frowned and his smile widened. “And I suppose I can’t get out of it somehow…?”

His eyes glittered in mirth. “I would if I could, as well. But it seems there is not. I haven’t looked very hard, though. Maybe something will come up.”

“Let’s pray,” you mumbled. Then you looked up at him. “Why don’t you want to do it?”

He shrugged again. “It’s too much unnecessary work and stress. I rather like to duel on my own terms, and not someone else’s.” 

“So complicated,” you whispered, shaking your head. In truth, the issue wasn’t the fact that you had been forced into it, it was the fact that it had to do with dueling at all. But obviously Zane didn’t have that problem. 

You could hear the loud music pulsing from the boys’ dormitory. Glancing up at the building on the hill, you sighed. “This is so uncomfortable,” you said, pulling your hands into your sweatshirt sleeves. After a moment of silence, you looked over at him to see his eyebrows raised. You went hot. “Ignore that,” you mumbled, reaching up and grabbing your bun out of nervousness and then playing with your piercings. He watched all of this and chuckled under his breath.

“I’m sorry,” he said with a sly smile. “I tried not to disturb you.” He crossed his arms and settled back into himself a little. You took the time to survey him: his shoulders were pulled up a little too high—very tensed, apparently—and his a-little-longer-than-shoulder-length hair was the same oceanic teal as his eyes, which were, you found, the same color as your eyes. This semi-new development was very interesting.

“You didn’t,” you quickly told him when you realized he’d been staring at you, waiting for a response. You sighed very deeply and looked around yourself at the water, cut through with orange and red light, and at the tree-covered island rising behind you. You slowly sank to the ground and sat on the edge of the dock, legs crossed into a pretzel so as not to get wet. You folded into yourself and tried to conserve heat by attempting to burrow further into your sweatshirt to no avail. 

You assumed Zane would get bored of you and walk away, but after a minute or so of silence he, too, sat down on the dock’s edge. You glanced at him inconspicuously from the corner of your eye and saw as he gazed out at the water and looked generally relaxed and impassive.

You had to swallow before you tried to speak. “What were you going to do?” you asked. “Instead of going to the dance, what were you going to do on the dock?” This was said softly and perhaps hesitantly, as you didn’t know whether or not he was done with talking, but the question was eating at you and it seemed like an important one. 

He tilted his head and eyes toward you leisurely and half-smiled. “Nothing at all.”

“You were just going to… be here?” You guessed that was what you were going to do, too, but you had always assumed Zane might have some important thing going on and didn’t have time to just ‘be,’ and maybe he’d come down to make phone calls or think Deep Thoughts or just be generally classy and composed. Normal people did nothing at all sometimes, but Zane was not normal.

“I was,” he replied under his breath. The predatory look returned and his normally placid, pool-like eyes were sharp and glittering and turned on you with a hawk-like intensity. 

You scrunched your face up in confusion and nodded slowly. “What are you doing for vacation?” you asked compulsively. 

Zane looked significantly surprised at the question. You wondered if anyone had ever had the chance to ask the Zane Truesdale about mundane things like vacation. It didn’t seem like the type of thing his usual companions would talk about. 

“I’m going to Bora Bora,” he said. 

“Bora Bora?” you squeaked. “What—What are you going to do on Bora Bora?”

Zane shrugged halfheartedly. “My father has business there.”

“Business on a tropical island?”

“Yes.”

You tried to make sense of that in your head, but the image of men in suits walking along white-sand beaches blocked a lot of your thinking power. “Oh,” you managed, blinking the scene away. “Th-that must be nice…”

He made a face and shrugged again. “I guess. The weather is very beautiful.”

“I’m sure it is…” There was a pause while he looked out at the bay and you stared at him intently. When he made eye contact with you, you jumped in shock. 

“What are you doing for vacation?” he questioned, giving you a decisively searching look.

You frowned. “Nothing. I’m going home and sitting around and eating. It’s going to be super eventful.”

He tilted his head slowly and blinked. “I don’t think I’ve ever had a vacation where I did nothing.” He seemed to consider something. Then he smiled at you almost coyly, or maybe that was just his natural smile. “You don’t sound too excited…”

You groaned and rolled your eyes, slapping your hands over your face. “It’s going to be so boring,” you mumbled. You sat there like that for a minute and then slowly lowered your hands to see him peering at you in amusement. You reddened and returned your hands to your face quickly. “What?” you asked, voice muffled by the fabric of your sweatshirt.

He chuckled. “We could trade,” he muttered, voice heavy with some mix of sarcasm and delight. 

“I don’t look good in a bathing suit.”

He laughed at that, a genuine one. Laughed for a while, and then he stopped and sighed. There was a multi-minute-long silence in which you dropped your hands and just stared at the bay and he closed his eyes and sat there placidly. The bass-heavy music from the dance could be heard faintly from the glass-walled building on the side of the hill. You looked over your shoulder at the place and saw colored lights emanating from it. Part of you wanted to be there and part of you had no idea why you thought that and subsequently realized none of you wanted to be there, and why should you, because Zane Truesdale was having a weird bonding moment with you on a dock at seven (actually more like eight now) in the evening in the cold, which was getting progressively colder. No, this was fine; you were just embarrassed to think so. 

When you returned to the real world, you realized he was staring at you calmly. “Yes?” you prompted cautiously, lest he become agitated and flee into the forest or fall into the water or something.

“Our eyes are the same color,” he said, voice thoughtful. You froze and stared owlishly at him. He examined your face openly and tilted his head in the other direction.

“Yeah, they are,” you wanted to say, but Zane leaned very close suddenly and held up a hand for you to quiet.

“I’m going to kiss you,” he said.

All of your internal organs evaporated or exploded or something like that. “W-what?”

Zane gave you a very matter-of-fact look. “I’m going to kiss you,” he reiterated. You sat there in complete shock as he leaned in and pressed his lips to yours solidly. You closed your eyes reflexively and tried very hard to calm down in case you began hyperventilating. He reached a hand up and lightly held one side of your face, and all of this was very warm and very surreal. Then all of it stopped and suddenly he wasn’t kissing you anymore, his hand was gone, and you were sitting there catatonic while he stared at you from about a foot away. 

You blinked and knocked yourself back into the real world. You made wide eyes and impulsively touched your mouth. Zane licked his lips slightly and blinked very cat-like. “That was good, I’d say,” he said quietly, voice a lilt and on the edge of amused.

“S-sure,” you barely got out. You thought your throat may have closed up it was so hard to breathe. But then the feeling passed and you just felt light. He was still gazing at you with an animal intensity. You sighed and reached up to toy with an earring. “Well,” you said. “It’s good we got that out of the way, huh?”

“Oh, yes. Now we won’t have anything hanging between us.” It was so obviously sarcasm, you couldn’t believe he was being sarcastic. He smirked at you easily. “It’s all very comfortable now, right?”

You were suddenly exhausted. “Not exactly,” you mumbled, toying with the idea of falling unconscious as an escape strategy. 

He didn’t say anything but smiled at you languidly. This silence went on for a good two minutes and you just stared between him and the bay. The heavy thump of bass vibrated faintly over the trees and you focused very hard on that peculiar sensation in an attempt to distract yourself from the intensity of his gaze, which was making your skin busy. 

He sighed. “Well, this turned out better than I imagined it would,” he said thoughtfully, turning his eyes to the water. 

“How did you imagine it?” 

“Boring.”

“I’m glad I could entertain you.” 

“Me, too.” The look he gave you was, at the least, appreciative. You chose to pointedly ignore it and instead stare down at your hands which were groping each other in your lap. 

“Could we, like, make this not awkward,” you deadpanned after a moment. 

He chuckled. “Of course. What would you like to talk about, then?”

“I don’t know.”

“Well, me neither.”

“Think a little harder,” you told him. “Come on, you’re the smart one here.”

He smiled widely, his eyes glittering dark in the waning light. He leaned toward you, resting his weight on a bent elbow. As this happened, you glanced down and realized that this movement had pulled the fabric of his crisp black shirt in the direction of one shoulder and you could clearly see his pale skin pulled taut over his collar bone. 

“I’m going to kiss you again,” he said.

“You’re very thin, you know that?” You blinked at him as he gave what you supposed was a look that would have sent any other girl but you into spontaneous orgasm. 

Zane stared at you for a moment and then laughed. “You’re funny,” he said, sitting upright and brushing a hand through his turquoise hair. Then he gave you a very cat-like look. “This is much better than the dance would have been, Aila.”

“Oh, I’m sure.” You didn’t know what to do with yourself. You didn’t think he knew what to do either.

Zane sighed. After a moment, he pushed himself to his feet and extended a hand to help you up. You took his grasp and felt yourself get pulled to standing position by an unexpectedly strong force. Out of nowhere, and before you could register it, Zane was standing very close to you and he leaned down until his bright, predatory eyes were on the same level as yours. You felt everything freeze and your breathing slow, but your heart rate shot through the roof and you wondered briefly if you were dying. 

He smiled and you could see the delight light up his oceanic eyes like blue cracks of lightning. “Have a nice vacation, Aila,” he said practically under his breath but very intently and clearly. 

“Yeah,” you breathed, too afraid to make much noise with him so close. “You too, Zane.”

The smile in his eyes was overwhelming but his face had reverted to its odd, usual placidity. “Thanks,” he whispered somewhat playfully, reminding you once again that this absurd interaction was taking place on a dock at eight in the evening in the cold, and it was all very fucking ridiculous.

He kissed you again, kind of aggressively, and, in all honesty, your brain shut off and the most you could comprehend was the push and the heat and the feeling of his hand on your lower back. When he pulled away after almost a minute you tried to find your footing and not fall into the water, and then you looked up at him and realized your breathing was very heavy.

He looked extremely pleased or sated or one of those things. Both of those things. You felt heat consume your face and you wiped at your mouth with the back of your sweatshirt sleeve since your lips felt a little too tingly for your liking. “Is this what you usually do when you don’t go to dances?” you asked, voice muffled by the fabric. 

“No,” he said, blinking languidly. A small smirk pulled itself across his face. A device on him beeped and he made no indication he heard it. “I have to go now, unfortunately. We can continue this after the new semester resumes, I guess, if that’s what you’d like.” He seemed to chuckle at your confused, flustered squeak. “Have a nice vacation, Aila.”

“Yeah, you too, Zane.” You sighed deeply and tucked your hands into your sleeves, watching as he turned and walked off in the other direction down the dock toward the private boats, giving you a small, nonchalant wave as he did so. You waved back even though he couldn’t see. 

You crinkled your face up in confusion. “Whatever,” you whispered dully, feeling an odd combination of butterflies and hurricanes pick up in your stomach. You then turned and made your way up the slope toward the dorms for the evening.