Random Book of Jaric Fluff & Stuff

Scene # 14

"Japeth," Aric leered, oozing his name like it was poison. "Welcome back."

"I am fortunate to be back, Captain," Japeth answered, determined to keep his head about him on this level of the game. He wouldn't lose his cool and slap Aric in the face, no matter how satisfying it would be.

"Indeed you are," Aric smirked. "Forget about something?"

"Here or elsewhere?" Japeth challenged, before remembered his plan. Shit.

The glint in Aric's eyes told him he was mildly amused and aware of his small triumph. "Regardless, the School Master has been quite relieved to hear of your return. A little too relieved, I daresay."

Fighting to keep the emotions off of his face, Japeth nodded. "Do I have an assignment?"

"You are to remain at my side at all times except for when I dismiss you," Aric told him before turning on one heel and walking towards the nearby staircase. "Come, pet, we have things to do."

Itching to erase that word from Aric's vocabulary, Japeth followed in a sickeningly obedient manner. Aric had become the twisted psycho Dean Brunhilde had feared he would, and Japeth was sure there was so much more he didn't know yet.

"What the hell am I supposed to be doing?" He burst out several hours later.

"Keeping me company," Aric drawled. "Unless there's something else you'd rather be doing in here."

"Leaving would be done out of here, if that counts," Japeth mumbled.

"You're not leaving until you're dismissed," Aric reminded him for the three hundredth time that day.

"I know that, but why do you keep me around? Why chose me as your pet?" Japeth asked, genuinely curious to know the answer. "And none of that 'I knew you before' crap."

Temporarily, Aric softened the tiniest bit. "You are the only living thing, animal, plant or human who ever understood me for who I truly am."

"That was a sham!" Japeth lied, having no motives to opening his mouth other than that he didn't want to hear what the sadist had to say. "Rhian forced me to do it to get closer to you because you were the only one not reveling his damn glory!"

"You've not gotten better at lying," Aric said tonelessly, cold facade sliding back into place without effort.

"I know, I just don't want to hear you say that. Right now... I don't want to have any kind of connection to you," Japeth admitted.

"Now's who as apathetic as Hell? You complained about that an awful lot back at Arbed. Quite the change, pet," Aric glanced over at Japeth but remained seated.

"I'm protecting myself, just as you did. You're still apathetic, so don't go blaming me," Japeth told him, scims curling through his fingers like scaly green ribbons on his command. He latched his icy eyes onto his hands and refused to look up from the undulating pattern of scims around flesh for some time.

"That I am," Aric answered quietly after a minute or two. "And that I always believed I'd be." Japeth looked up at last, only to be met with Aric following the outline of a knife absentmindedly with his finger, gaze far off.

"I know you don't want to hear this, and I almost don't want to say this, Japeth. Once our friendship evolved a little, I tricked myself into believing another stupid, pointless fantasy-similar to the one, coincidentally, that had me putting up walls in the first place. I told myself that someone could care about me." A long pause stretched the silence until Aric sighed and continued.

"This is generally the pity part of my tragic backstory, but I don't want a single ounce of anyone's pity, nor from those words either. I'm a shattered boy, Japeth, and I'll be damned if you weren't the magic that resealed me whole. Every eye roll with those damn iceberg eyes of yours. Every slither of your scaly demons. Every smile, every joke, every touch, every moment. I sound so goddamn desperate and vulnerable, but I can't control my sadist urges at frequent times."

"I'm all too well acquainted with that," Japeth agreed ruefully, then fell silent as Aric opened his mouth again. He would listen to his best friend, especially during a conversation important as this one.

"My psychotic behavior gave me my reputation, which led to my personality. Once I figured out that nobody wanted to be near me, I began to naturally repel them. I made a game out of it, and didn't give a shit what anybody thought. Because, damn, I was my own person, and I sure as hell wouldn't let anybody or anything trip me up."

But then you came, with your stupid ice-blue eyes and your stupid serpentine smirk and your stupid little snaky servants. I had no choice but to succumb to the magnitude of it all. When I first laid eyes on you, you were so damn breathtaking that I would've choked on my air if not for the metal collar slowly draining the oxygen out of my lungs." He smiled dryly at the memory.

"And the way you gave me that look of daring, well, I didn't realize it at first, but I fell headfirst off the cliff of past reason and tradition. And it was for you, the troubled twin with an irrepressible Evil inside of you that only I recognized and understood. We were two souls of a rare kind, one more carnal and malicious than the others. One that the others feared and degraded to make sure we were never a threat. But that had so much of a harder time with because we were so goddamn inseparable. Our greatest weapons were, quite simply, each other. Our only true allies were each other."

Japeth slowly tilted his head to look at Aric in a new light than he did previously to Aric's speech. Even if he hated himself for thinking of the possibility, Aric could be a wonderful actor. However, from experience, Japeth knew that note of raw honesty in the black-haired boy's voice that only was audible at times involving even a hint of unbridled and free emotion.

"You were my antidote, Japeth, to all of the shit problems and fireballs of misery Life threw at me. I endured the pain without rapport to it's vicious self, so you wouldn't have to be exposed to any more. We're two broken boys who need each other. What do you say, Japeth? Will you come back to me?"

"As your pet?" Japeth inquired. He had to hear it from Aric's mouth, even if he already knew the answer to the question.

"As my best friend. My equal." Aric finally turned his head to look at him, and Japeth's heart stuttered at the look in Aric's eyes. It was such a convoluted mix of emotion that had been lurking in the sadist's core, finally unleashed and visible for another to see and accept, if they so chose to. That alone pushed Japeth to his answer, without the extra bit.

Aric slowly held out his hand, Japeth's red ribbon streaking his pale hand in a slash of crimson. Japeth stared at the ribbon, holding so many memories in the danger of blood and the beauty of bloom. To accept meant it back. Re-gifted, from the original owner himself.

"Yes, Aric, I will. You're the only one who can keep up with me, after all." As he spoke, Japeth rose and walked over to where Aric was sitting, before taking a seat next to him. He gently took the ribbon and twined it between his fingers as he went on. "I know how you feel; I've been there. That's what ties us together: pain. Pain forms the strongest bonds of all, which I'm familiar with through you. But it's not the pain that forms the bonds, nor the suffering. It's the overcoming, and that's what I've done with you. I've overcome, endured, survived. All because of you and your goddamn violet eyes."

The boys both shared a rare smile, before Japeth leaned in and clasped his arms hard around Aric in a fierce hug. It took no hesitation before Aric's arms latched around Japeth in return, and they sank into the hug, holding each other tight as if they were in a hurricane.

And they were. Surviving solely with each other as always, neither letting go.

Lol we go from Japeth wanting to slap Aric to Japeth hugging Aric in less than 1500 words.  What a roller coaster. Yeah, I felt like this scene didn't need to be dragged on and on-the message was simple enough-although Aric sure had a lot to say. :) I think that'll wrap up this six-scene little fanfic of Jaric. Hope you liked it! :)