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“I am telling you: you. Are. Dead. Wrong!” it was an exasperated scream that came out of Ace’s mouth. His so called friends had been at it for what felt like hours, he should have just walked away as soon as he got the chance. He would have liked to do so, but Ortho was surely going to catch him way too quickly and just bring him back to his torture room. If it was Jack or Deuce, he could have fought back, but Ortho? He wasn’t winning against high technology and he knew it. So there he was, forced to stay sat on a chair, surrounded by the other first years he once assumed were his friends. He didn’t know for how long they all have been there, with those idiots spouting nonsense, and him slowly losing his mind trying to get them to reason.
“Come on Ace. It will be better once you admit it! We can solve this” he was this close to just strangle Deuce. So so so close.
“Increased heart rate above critical level. Tightened jaw. Possibility of anger reaction increased… guys I don’t think he is lying” Ortho’s results made him wish for a ray of hope. Maybe they could finally end this.
“He IS lying. Everyone noticed. Well, aside from Grim and Yuu I guess” his hopes were crushed almost immediately by Epel. Ace really wanted to go and kick Vil for creating such a cute little monster.
“… what if he just hasn’t realized it?” Jack filled the silence of the classroom after some moments of hesitation. He didn’t look certain of his words either, but after some moments the others immediately comment on that.
“That’s even less likely. He is not that dumb… Is he?”
“That’s stupid, it’s sooo clear”
“It makes sense. I would expect it from that human”
“Considering the previous analysis… there is a non zero chance that you are correct”
The only good thing that came out of the messy replies was that everyone was too distracted arguing with the someone else to notice Ace silently escaping from the room and finally achieving freedom.
He didn’t walk far from the classroom when he spotted two familiar figures across the corridor.
“Yuu, Grim!” before he even realized he had already called for them, while jogging to reach them.
“Fna! Hi Ace, did you lose the other half of your pair?” Ace didn’t notice the smile on his own face until it died after Grim’s comment.
“Hey, we are not glued by the hip, we can go each in our separate ways. Plus, he is being mean and bullying poor little me, along with the others. Really, after everything I do for them!” he started complaining, at ease in the familiar presence.
Yuu laughed at his words, while Grim started to further complain, but Ace was suddenly more distracted by Yuu’s laugh and the way the light hit him just right. He looked straight out of a romance manga. He felt his cheeks burning hot at the sight, and he cursed at his friends. It was all their fault, he was getting weird ideas now.
Flashbacks of the past torture replayed in his mind.
“You like Yuu” stated Deuce firmly, as if he just discovered the secret of life.
“What? I guess I do like myself…” a nervous laugh followed Ace's reply. Why were his friends so weird?
“Not you. Yuu. You like him”
And then it all went disastrously downwards for his mental state.
He was forced to listen to such nonsense for such a long time, of course now he was being affected by it. Like he could ever like the gentle, kind, funny Yuu. Sure, they spent a lot of time together, but so he did with Deuce. And he definitely didn’t like Deuce, if anything he wanted to strangle him at the moment.
“We were going to Sam’s Shop to get some materials, want to come along?” before Ace could even think about what to answer, his feet had already started to move in the correct direction. Yuu quickly followed him, covering the short distance he had created in just a few steps, reminding Ace of how big Yuu was. Grim was sharing some anecdote about a past lesson, but now Ace’s mind was too busy following the previous line of thoughts to really consider him, so he limited himself to some circumstantial hums to let him keep talking. Meanwhile Yuu was gently keeping Grim in his arms. Hell, Ace knew that Yuu played sports in his original world, but those muscles were huge. Was it double the size of Ace’s arms? Of course, it was no trouble for him to carry Grim, what was the limit? Could he carry someone? What about Ace himself?
Ace pinched himself. Wrong thought direction. Wrong. All those idiots’ fault. He was just wondering normal things. Like any friend would. He was envious actually, he wanted that built for himself. Who wouldn’t like to be a handsome man filled with muscles that could carry people around. Everyone. Epel should be the first to get him and understand him better than the others.
He looked at the pair again, but he must have stared a bit too much, since Yuu turned too, making their eyes meet. He had a slightly confused expression, probably wondering why Ace was suddenly staring at him, but that didn’t stop him from a warm smile to be directed at Ace almost immediately.
Ace wondered if he was going to catch fire. He automatically mirrored a smile, hoping it didn’t look too nervous while a hand going to scratch the back of his head.
“You better calm down Ace, your heart rate skyrocketed. I could power up the whole Ignihyde by how fast it’s racing”
Ortho broke the tenderness of the moment appearing out of nowhere. Ace’s violent instinct came back roaring once more, his smile fading into a pout.
“We told you Ace. Just admit it. It's for the best.” the others soon appeared from the corner they just crossed. Maybe he should have run away earlier, but he was distracted by Yuu. No, not Yuu. Yuu and Grim, both of them. He just decided to spend time with some friends. Nothing more.
“I won’t say it” he had to put an end to it. The sooner the better. Plus now there was a high risk of Yuu and Grim getting dragged into that. That was beyond what his ego could allow.
“Say what?” cute innocent Yuu, of course, had to step in. His cheeks became even hotter.
“Nothing! They just want to be the death of me.” Could he still save the situation? He had to try. He had to preserve that little dignity he still had.
“We were talking about Ace’s dream. Just explaining it to the others that didn’t witness it in person” explained Ortho, with the fellow first year nodding to support that.
Ace sighed, there was no getting out of the situation unharmed. He could just hope that Yuu would not join them in the mocking, that would hurt more than he wanted to admit.
“It wasn’t that crazy come on. I expected to see more strange things, but it was weirdly normal…” Yuu commented, getting lost in his thoughts for some seconds before going on with his discourse “Actually, it was so normal that we could just do it. A trip to the beach all together sounds fun!”
“Ah! Screw you. I knew I could count on Yuu to have my back!” excitement once more filled Ace’s heard. If all the teasing was the price to pay to enjoy a vacation with Yuu, he was willing to do it another thousands time.
“We should get the upperclassmen to join too, before they get too busy for their fourth year” at those words, the others cheered, but Ace felt their eyes fixed on him to observe his reaction. He kept on his usual smile, though he wasn’t sure he succeeded in hiding the small cracks in it. Sure… the other guys would be there too. He forgot.
“It’s getting late sorry guys, I’ll try to ask Sam if he has any deal for vacations spots and update you!” Yuu bid his farewell from the group and left with Grim still happily in his arms. The pair had barely disappeared in the distance when the group went back to merciless tease Ace.
“Ace, your fake smiles are usually much better than that. Don’t worry, we can come up with a flu or something” the devilish grin on Epel’s face sting more that the words.
“I don’t know what you are talking about. I was just not happy at the thought of like, Leona and Vil being there with us”
“Sure, keep on telling yourself that.” Ace wondered how much faith Epel had in himself, when he was much shorter than himself, to keep on teasing him that much.
“It’s clear you were already daydreaming of spending your time with Yuu. You looked so annoyed when we showed up. It was kinda rude, honestly”
“I didn’t even know half of you! Of course I was annoyed. Plus, I would like to remind you, Sebek, that you started lecturing me. Did you want me to happily accept the words of a stranger?” Sebek couldn’t help but look away at the words. Ace understood that the Diasomnia guy felt bad about it, but he needed to use any weapon he had to fight against this bullying.
“Too bad I wasn’t there to see it for myself…”
“I’m actually very grateful that most of you weren’t there, Juice being there already caused this disaster. I don’t want this to get any bigger than it already is…” seeing Deuce flinching at the wrong name was as much satisfaction as he could get from the conversation. That was not enough to stop him from replying unfortunately.
“Oh come on! You dreamt of Yuu being able to come and go as he likes. No one else did”
“That honestly says more about you all being awful friends rather than me”
Checkmate.
There was a hint of shame in everyone’s eyes after Ace spoke those words. He was not going to go down without a fight, and he wasn’t wrong. As the others started to argue between each other to defend themselves, he got lost in his mind. If they also cared so much about Yuu, why wouldn’t they wish for him to be able to go home? And what was so weird about wanting your friend to be able to reach you whenever you wanted? Sure, the idea of Yuu going back to their world and never coming back hurt more than he wanted to admit to anyone… but if it’s just another normal portal, everything was just perfect! Plus, they could travel to a whole other different world! He wished to go and explore, obviously!
There was no need to further analyze those feelings, especially if the result was just going to be a broken heart… Yuu would eventually go back to his world, and Ace knew he wasn’t brave enough to leave everything he knew behind. On top of that, Yuu’s world didn’t have magic… what was he going to do then? Would he lose his magic too? What if he kept it, but lost control over it? Would he overblot without no one being able to stop him? Those questions were all too heavy and all too present in his mind to care about anything else.
Maybe at another time, after there was a safe and happy answer to all of the other questions above, he could consider the secondary questions that lingered in his mind. He could give a thought on why his gaze always stopped a second too long on Yuu rather than the others. Maybe he could acknowledge that Yuu’s presence was able to improve his day almost immediately. If it was a good day, he could even listen to Ortho’s analysis of his heart rate. But that day had not yet come, so it was pointless to worry over those thoughts, it was much better to just enjoy the time he could spend with Yuu for as long as he could.