AN: Anyone remember 'Zoom-Lens' from the Alphabet? Well, this is the expanded version behind it. It wasn't that high up in the voting poll, but it was one of my favourites and I really wanted to write it so its here before its more wanted brethren.

Yes, believe it or not dear readers I have, at last, made these guys English. Well, more European if you want to get technical. I've been wanting to do this for ages and I figured that if people could make these guys American, well, I could sure as hell put them where I wanted to, too. Atemu, also, isn't as shy as I had intended him to be (like he was in the drabble) he kind of grew a backbone without my consent, and I like him better this way. I'm pretty sure the nickname 'Até' was created by the brilliant Ocean, thus I have decided it should be canon and am using it.

Summery: The eccentrically French, but brilliant photographer Yuugi finds his perfect model in a shy, unassuming student. But the real challenge is not persuading Atemu to pose… YxA/YY AU. Romance. A three-shot fic.

Zoom-Lens

AKA 'Aperture'

Part One

'Mon Cheri'

Spring this year was particularly vibrant. Considering the national, unspoken agreement of the country's inhabitants that English seasons consisted of three winters and a spring, this came as a widely welcomed surprise. The sun seemed bent on outdoing its last dismal attempt at a summer, and pleasant heat had prevailed over heavy April rains for weeks now. Mossy lawns had exploded into a carpet of buttercups and daisies, dandelions determined to make the most of the weather had turned the air into a dry soup of feathery seeds.

Atemu sighed heavily, letting his head fall back to rest against the old blossom tree. The bark was cool and dry to the touch; the little grooves and nooks caught strands of his dark hair and tugged lightly when he moved his head. Closing his eyes against the bright sunlight filtering between the vivid pink flowers and the odd off-green leaf, Atemu let the constant murmur of voices meld with the drone of traffic in the near-distance. A light breeze lifted the pages of the open book on his lap; a little yellow at the edges from the hours it spent stuffed in his messenger bag. The words had turned to meaningless black squiggles some time ago, melding into a snakes and ladders game of pointless repetition that his over-relaxed mind could make no sense of. These were the kinds of days he dreamed of, where the gentle afternoons melded with the movements of a self-satisfied cat into long evenings with dusky sunsets.

Click!

"Well hello, mon cheri."

Jerked out of his half-doze, and disorientated by the dazzling flash that followed the second click, Atemu blinked heavily up at the loud intruder, who was stood just out of the shade he had been enjoying a moment ago.

"Wai – what?"

"No, no, don't move, you'll ruin the light. The moment. The flowers."

The voice was luminous. Light and filled with energy, it carried the soft rumble that was the sensual accent of a Frenchman, the vowels tinted lightly with a few years of English living. Regular clicking issued from the expensive looking camera obscuring most of the stranger's face; a halo of dark ebony and gold hair was about all he could see clearly.

"Stop that!" Atemu closed his book with a snap and pushed it aside, he stood quickly to stare incredulously at the stranger, "Who do you think you are?"

A business card was promptly presented to him; Atemu fumbled slightly to take the unexpected offering. The stranger had finally paused in his manic photo taking, after a glance at the strange man's smile; Atemu read the beautifully embellished card, his eyebrows rising at the strange name.

Gabriel 'Yuugi' Renoir: Professional Photographer

A photographer? He sneered while his head was titled so the newcomer couldn't see. The idiot probably considered himself an artist. The obscurity of the name threw him off: two of them were clearly French, but the middle had to have been an 'artistic' improvement meant to groom the artist's ego. Atemu looked up from the business card to meet the curved glass of the camera lens, now much closer to his face.

"Mr. Renoir – "

"Yuugi."

Atemu lifted an eyebrow, the stranger's insistence on informality clashing with the blunt manner in which he corrected Atemu. He opened his mouth to speak, but was suddenly interrupted.

"Enough introductions!" Yuugi broke the moment of silence with a flourish of his arms, "Sit back down, mon cheri, and for the sake of the Lord be careful not to disturb the petals."

Petals? Atemu looked down sharply to see if any of the tree's blossoms had stuck to his thin burgundy jumper, the movement caused a small pink blur to float down in front of his eyes. Scowling, he quickly ruffled his dark hair to dislodge the few that had tangled in with the thick locks, he hadn't even realised they had been falling.

Yuugi's expressive eyes followed Atemu's hand movements forlornly, the colour of those eyes, Atemu noted, was quite extraordinary. A blue so deep they turned purple in the light.

"Ah, mon cheri. You ruined the petals."

"Please stop calling me that."

"What else am I to call you when you have yet to grant me the knowledge of your name?"

"It's Atemu."

"Ah. 'Tem, 'Temu, Até?"

"Atemu, please." He insisted.

Yuugi looked him up and down, "No. That will not do. How about Até then? No, something much sweeter is in order. How about a flower? A bittersweet little flower… Little Rose? Ah hah, perfect. It fits beautifully!"

Atemu felt embarrassed heat infuse his cheeks, forcing down the colour only by concentrating, he asked, "Dare I ask why?"

Yuugi lifted his hand to toy with a strand of deep gold hair, curling it round thin, elegant fingers. A playful look danced on the curve of his smooth lips.

"It appears you just did," with another flourish, Yuugi let go of his hair and placed the tips of his fingers below the deliciously defined curve of Atemu's chin. Their skin did not touch, but came close enough for Atemu to feel the heat of the photographer's skin. A ghost touch that skilfully manipulated Atemu into lifting his chin up as well as a forceful grip would have done.

"Your eyes, mon cheri, are as brilliant as the bud of the young rose. True life, true intensity, all furled up and hidden from the world, waiting for their time. And yet, there are thorns, dark corners to them that threaten to hurt the unwary."

Atemu couldn't quite find words to reply to that, the heat in his cheeks warmed past the point of being able to hide the resulting red tint, even under the light dusky colour of his skin. Then Yuugi grinned and pulled his hand away.

"Also, flowers seem to like you, in that girly kind of happy way."

Snapped out of his daze by the grinning little imp and the implications that had just been made, Atemu scowled again.

Yuugi quickly raised the camera and snapped another photograph with an obnoxious flash.

Feeling a nerve below his eye twitch, Atemu asked, "Are we done?"

Yuugi's features melted into a puzzled look, "Done?"

"With this," Atemu made a neutral sort of hand gesture towards the camera, "Whatever it was you were just doing."

"I was creating art. And you, Little Rose – "

"Atemu."

" – are a fine piece of it. Come, come, we must return to my studio, inspiration can wait for no man!"

Atemu felt his cheeks heat up again when Yuugi took his arm in a deceptively firm grip, that angelic smile imploring him with a child-like pleasure to follow. Atemu's eyebrows furrowed in another scowl. He tugged his arm away and stepped back.

"Look, I don't know who you are, or what you're doing on campus, but I'm not following you anywhere."

He stooped to pick up his discarded book and bag, but as his fingers closed around the cover of his advanced forensics textbook, it was whisked away as if some genie had clicked his fingers and made it vanish in a poof of purple lamp-smoke. Atemu lifted his gaze to the only one who could be responsible. Yuugi was flicking through the pages with a half-interested, half-disgusted look.

"The things my medium is used for." He said, looking down at a full colour photograph of a badly decomposed woman.

"Those things help people find murderers," Atemu said, holding out his hand to take the book back, "Now, if you don't mind, I have lectures to attend."

Snapping the book shut, Yuugi moved it out of his reach, holding it behind his back with the teasing air of an older child hiding another child's sweets. Instead, the Frenchman took hold of Atemu's outstretched hand, and pulled him up to his full height. Scowling up at the full three inches of extra height Yuugi had on him, Atemu tried to extricate his fingers from the other's grip.

"This is harassment, Mr. Renoir."

"Are you really so adamant to refuse this chance?"

Atemu froze; suddenly finding himself pinned between the trunk of the old tree and the warm body of the photographer. Yuugi's halo of gold hair caught the light and reflected it like water, his eccentric manner changed to smooth self-control, coercing with an enthralling magnetic pull. Wide-eyed, and feeling much like a trapped rabbit, Atemu's breathing picked up. Yuugi smiled triumphantly.

"Men are all so easy to decipher. It is like you write the maps of your minds upon your foreheads."

Then, Yuugi spoke in a much softer voice, like the rippling of tigers fur in the deep green of the rainforest.

"Follow me, mon cheri. I will not hurt you."

Yuugi's studio turned out to be around the corner from the quiet part of campus Atemu enjoyed, which didn't exactly give him enough time to rethink the exact logics of what he was doing. Yuugi seemed to have this uncanny ability of restricting all rational thought in favour of frivolous impulses, chatting all the way down the busy main road about this, that, and everything else. The photographer's mind jumped from subject to subject without any apparent links, discussing everything with the same amount of boundless enthusiasm.

Atemu found himself wondering if the strange man was taking something.

One thing was for certain, however, Gabriel ("Yuugi, call me Yuugi") Renoir was not short of cash. The studio was less a work place, more an extravagant mess. Situated in the middle of town, it had once been a lavish penthouse, but was now cluttered from ceiling to floor with portraits, cityscapes, empty frames, old film, and leaning-tower-of-Pisa stacks of paper wobbling on the coffee table.

Atemu wondered exactly how old Yuugi was to have this sort of money. He didn't look a day over twenty-one.

"I hope you like them?" Yuugi asked in his excellent accented English, appearing at Atemu's right shoulder as he gazed up at the sheer number of photographs worked like the brickwork itself into the fabric of the studio rooms. Some framed in ornate mock gold, some in thin modern chrome, and some simply stuck on with Blu-Tack, the sheer volume of variety was enormous.

"Yes," Atemu heard himself say, "Are they all yours?"

"These are," Yuugi said, "The ones in the other room are all from people I take inspiration from."

There was a deceptively pleasant pause.

"What am I here for?" Atemu asked suddenly, speaking quietly in a conscious desire to retain the atmosphere of serenity that had settled over them.

"Because I see something in you that I cannot, at present, capture. I am hoping, given a little time and a little more of your patience, that we will discover how to."

"And what is 'it'?"

"As of yet, neither of our tongues have a word for it."

Atemu waited a moment for Yuugi to elaborate. When he heard no sound from behind his right shoulder, he turned and frowned confusedly. Yuugi was already halfway across the room, apparently finished with the subject. How did he move so quietly?

"Mr. Renoir?"

"Yuugi," Yuugi said, insistent.

"Yuugi," Atemu copied, a little exasperated, "You still didn't, exactly, explain what it is I'm doing here."

"Até, are you a little dim?"

Atemu felt that little nerve below his eye twinge at the sound of the infuriating pet name, "I didn't come here to be insulted. And it's Atemu."

"Nonsense. And most people can work out when they are the subject of some interest."

Atemu's eyebrows arched sharply, his voice rose incredulously when he asked, "You want me to model?"

Yuugi gave him a side-long look, "No, I want your sparkling personality and open mindedness."

Feeling his cheeks flush with heat at the jibe, Atemu dropped his gaze to an old pizza box in the corner.

"I haven't even agreed to this."

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Yuugi nod sagely.

"True," the photographer said, "but nor have we discussed pay."

"Huh?" Atemu forgot the previous sarcastic comment in the face of this new focus. The thought of him actually being paid for something like modelling had never even crossed his mind; it had seemed like a ridiculous profession for Barbie dolls and pretty boys until now.

Yuugi rolled his eyes, "Are you always this slow, Até? You can do it for free if you want, but what with you being a student, you would appreciate the income, yes?"

The frayed shoulder strap of his ancient messenger bag tickled the edges of his gripping fingers with suddenly pathetic little threads of cloth and nylon. His stomach reminded him that a meal that didn't consist of ten pence noodles and supermarket-value beans would be much appreciated.

Dubiously he asked, "And what would I have to do, exactly?"

"Oh, it's really very simple. Come, sit down and I'll explain."

Yuugi waved him over after clearing some space on a fashionable cream couch by sweeping an arm across the cluttered cushions. Magazines and loose photos flopped to the carpeted floor ungracefully, and predominantly unnoticed by Yuugi, who settled himself onto one side of the couch like a cat with one knee bent under him.

Attempting to retain a little more grace, Atemu picked his way over to the couch and sat firmly on the opposite side, keeping his bag close to his feet.

With a smile like light and gold, Yuugi gestured to the wall opposite a row of vast windows, his sweeping arm encompassing all the images fixed to the pale paint.

"These are all my favourites. Do you notice anything about them?"

It took Atemu a moment to take them all in, then another to realise what was notable. Every style, from black and white to abstract, from sublime to rural landscape, each image was a striking capture of a perfect instant. But something unbalanced that variety.

"There are no people. At least, not close up."

Yuugi nodded again, "This is not unintentional. I have tried many times to find enough in a single person to keep my lens interested long enough for the films to be developed. None of the ones I took came out good enough."

"And you expect me to be good enough?"

"I do not expect anything. I wait for what will come, to come. Nothing more."

Atemu was silent; he continued to scan the wall for anything strange or disquieting he should probably know about. Yuugi seemed so very genuine, but he had never posed for a camera before when it wasn't being held up by his mother or grandfather and accompanied by a sickly sweet "smile!"

"Forgive me, I still haven't told you what you, specifically, will be doing. It requires nothing more than a willingness to pout, smile, and, occasionally, look ever so slightly deranged.

"The work will easily fit around whenever you are available and feel like it, as I'll either be here, or somewhere in town probably being accused of harassment for taking photos again. I'll give you my mobile number."

Atemu licked his lips nervously, "And I won't be asked to do anything… degrading?"

"Good Lord, no. Absolutely everything is with your full consent."

"And I will be paid?"

"Before the sessions even begin, if you want."

"You know I'll be hopeless at this, right?"

Yuugi's smile softened, "We shall see."

Atemu wondered what (and more importantly why) he was agreeing to when he spoke his consent.

"Right!" Yuugi clapped his hands delightedly, "Now that's all sorted, can we finally start working?"

"Sure," Atemu said with a shrug of forced casualness.

"Excellent. Now, how to do this…" the photographer trailed off thoughtfully, the electric energy in his amethyst eyes retreating within.

Suddenly Yuugi beamed, in a single smooth movement he stood up and was rummaging through the mess that apparently had been some kind of glass cabinet before it became part of the chaos that was the studio. Muttered French drifted to his ears from Yuugi's person, unmistakable curses and oaths.

Atemu felt a small smile tug the corners of his lips, an almost affectionate exasperation lifting his mood.

"I had a camera here somewhere. I just saw it!"

Straightening up, Yuugi faced the rest of the room with a half-pout, scanning the mess. His searching eyes found a long landscape photograph of the Amazon and fixed on it. Bemused, Atemu's gaze was drawn to the other's chest, where rested the same large black and silver camera Yuugi had used to ambush him on campus.

"Um, Yuugi – "

"Quiet, Little Rose, I'm having a brain wave," he paused with the air of one on the verge of a 'eureka' moment. Atemu waited. Then the Frenchman smiled.

"Oh, that's perfect! Now all we need is a boat and a river." Yuugi turned sharply round to begin the search for a map, the heavy camera swung on its leather strap and bounced off his chest. Confused, he looked down.

"Oh, there's the camera. Honestly, Até, you could have said something."

Retort on the tip of his tongue, Atemu opened his mouth. And then closed it again. For that one moment, the light of the low-slung sun caught Yuugi's outline, and he glowed. The breath in Atemu's lungs shivered.

Then the Frenchman clicked his tongue in frustration, and bent to shuffle some papers aside to make room for the found map, and the sun was swallowed by a long cloud. Atemu blinked hard and tore his gaze away, curling his hands into fists, the fingernails cutting harshly into his palms, resisting the urge to clench his teeth.

"Where the hell have you been?"

"Would you believe me if I told you a photo shoot?"

Atemu laughed openly at his roommate's blatant disbelief, swinging his old bag round to land on the stained kitchen table. Ryou was neither gullible enough to fall for pranks, nor insightful enough to realise when something strange was real. At the moment, though, Atemu didn't blame him for his scepticism.

"Yeah, and I spent my morning reorganising the states of America into alphabetical order depending on the number of traffic cones found in each state. My arse, Atemu."

"No, I'm serious, Ryou. I really did," Atemu looked the other dead in the eye when the disbelief refused to lift, and pulled his phone out of his jeans pocket, "Here, I have his number. Call if you don't believe me."

Doubtfully, Ryou took the phone and read the new number and name on display. It could easily still be a hoax, but Atemu had never been one to be so elaborate. His humour was short and to the point.

Ryou handed the phone back to him without ringing the number, choosing instead to look at him closely as he flopped down onto a kitchen chair. It was the first time Atemu had been this sociable in weeks, and there was something in his manner that seemed different. Happy. Ryou smiled.

"Can you believe he's even going to pay me for this? Whether the photographs come out or not, I'm easily making a couple of hundred quid each meeting," Atemu laughed, "I sound like a call girl."

"He must be rich then," Ryou heard the kettle boil behind him, he turned to finish the cup of tea he had been making when Atemu bounded into the house, "Want one?"

Atemu shook his head at the offer, "No thanks. And yeah, he is. Definitely rich enough to pull off eccentric without it being madness, anyway. He's French, too, but I don't know how long he's been here. And he has these huge eyes just like light shining through amethysts."

Ryou laughed lightly; straining the teabag and flicking it into the dustbin, "Slow down there, Romeo."

Atemu felt embarrassed heat crawl over his skin. To distract himself, his fingers found the buckles on his bag and began to fasten and unfasten them. Ryou winced slightly when he saw his mistake.

"When are you meeting him again, then?"

"I, um, don't really know. I think it'll be a couple of days or something. He said he'd call me," Atemu half-mumbled, opening his bag and pulling out his textbooks.

Ryou sipped gingerly from the hot mug of tea, curiosity nipping at the back of his mind, "So then, in a word, what was he like?"

After long moments of deliberation, Atemu could only find one word that seemed to encompass the overall impression that was Yuugi.

"Perky."

Ryou laughed amiably and asked Atemu how on earth anyone had even managed to get him to contemplate something as outgoing as modelling in such a short space of time. Atemu wished he knew. Gently, he steered Ryou away from the topic of Yuugi, pulling out his nearly full pad of paper and an old biro to begin the day's homework.

Lifting the cover of his dog-eared advanced forensics; he leafed through the pages to find the section he had been attempting to read just a few hours ago. Ryou was saying something about his boyfriend, Bakura, being the usual insensitive jackass he always was, but his words had become part of the background. Trapped between the picture of the decomposing woman and a block of text describing a graph, were a small handful of half-crushed pink blossom petals. They sat conspicuously soft against the page.

Atemu felt an uncomfortable lump climb up from his stomach, as if he were going to be sick.

-

AN: Yes, Yuugi is mad. Yes, Atemu is special. And yes, I love them both (especially this off-his-rocker Yuugi) with an unholy passion.

You must love them too. It is Law.

To be honest, I'm anxious to know how this will be received by everyone, since it's a little different than usual. So if you could drop me a review, I'd love you all forever. This Three-shot is all but finished. I only have a couple of scenes to write up from the third part and get the whole thing beta'd. I decided to update this instead of another oneshot I was planning for today because it isn't quite finished, so look out for the oneshot next week! And the remaining parts should be up in the following weeks after that! And all while this is happening, King will begin construction once again!

Review Please!