A/N: Hello all! First time Gilmore Girls FanFic, long-time fan (long-time FanFic author) and this is my little market test. I've been playing around with a few plot ideas and I just wanted to see what everyone thought of this one, if the polls bode well then I'll continue with this one. This is a little off-beat in that I'm focusing on a relationship between Logan and Rory which sort of picks up after 'Written in the Stars'. So gentlepeople, tell me what you think of...

Disclaimer: This disclaimer will account for the entire FanFic, which is all this is. I have no affiliation with Warner Bros. or any of 'Gilmore Girls' respective owners. This is a Fan written piece of Fiction designed only for enjoyment and is entirely non-profit.

--Pride and True--

Chapter I: Biting the Hand

She stood amidst a crowd of frolicking students- totally defeated.

"Master and Commander..." the words rolled in her mind, "Master and Commander..."

What a pompous, full-of-himself, high-horse, drama-king. And that's what he was. He was a stuck-up drama-king. The spotlight was only ever on him, because he was all that mattered in his world. She knew the type-

"Have you put all the posters up, yet?" a familiar room-mate's voice screeched.

"No Paris, I'm just finding room for them," she answered bitterly, gazing momentarily upon her cradled collection of paper flyers, each with a photocopied print of the recently past Professor Asher Fleming. The whole fiasco had now been blown far beyond the realm of what Rory considered a tasteful commemoration of the ill man's life, but then again, she was dealing with Paris and had an almost blind loyalty to her friend.

The blonde haired boy returned from the second flight his comrades had rushed to but stopped mid-way down, noticing Rory once more.

"Are you shell-shocked?" he asked jauntily.

"Haven't you got bigger fish to fry?" Rory shot.

"No, I prefer making the little ones squirm a while," he retorted, smiling in a combination of malice and charm.

"I guess that's why you surround yourself with them... or is that just for padding?" she returned, nodding in the direction of the pair accompanying him whilst rocking her weight to one hip in a 'check-mate' motion.

For a moment she felt she may have trumped his wit, "they're just easier to keep in check when they're on a leash," he ridiculed, smiling happily all the while.

"Don't you see you're just tools?" Rory snapped, flailing an arm wildly and in doing so, inadvertently spreading the flyers everywhere.

The boy jumped down from his perch almost instinctively and began to huddle the papers together once more, as she watched, before quickly uniting her own help.

"What are we tools for?" the boy's offsider questioned sincerely. Rory glanced up at the pair of goons menacingly, who immediately got the picture and withdrew.

She resumed her gathering in silence, refusing to look at the boy or strike up any further argumentative chat. Her mind ran wildly, jumping from the boy to Paris to the many inked prints of Asher Fleming's withered-yet-warm face. Her hand plonked from paper to paper in a smooth motion, mindlessly. Her motion continued, sliding and grabbing the papers before she hit something warm which snapped her train of thought to an ever-loving halt.

It was like one of those corny Disney movies, only much cornier, she thought. Still, her dainty fingers grasped upon the top of his hand.

"I've heard of them biting the hand that feeds them..." the boy poked, "but this one takes the cake".

"Master... or is it Commander?" she began.

"It's both," he interjected.

"Shut up," she hammered, withdrawing her grasp and shuffling the papers quickly as she rose from the ground.

He copied her motion and got to his feet once more, still smiling.

"What do you want?" she asked exasperatedly, blushing madly but entirely unsure of why she was.

"Oh come on... you can say it," he grinned, somewhat evilly, "...thank you..." he teased.

"Thank you," she mimicked, before turning away and rushing hurriedly into her new room.

She leaned her back against the door and sighed... from relief? No. She wasn't afraid. At least not of his tomfoolery. It was an odd feeling. One she couldn't quite shake or determine the source of. Perhaps that was her cause for fear. Not knowing exactly why she felt the way she did.

"-and let me tell you, it might sound well and good to you that a man by the name of Asher would be fittingly cremated into ash but it does not go down well at all with Paris Gellar- not in the slightest Miss Sassypants," Paris screamed, launching herself into the room like a whirlwind on amphetamines.

Rory gazed at Paris with quietly. Trying to drown out her own discontented thoughts by listening to her friend blast another poor soul, unfortunate enough to have crossed Hurricane Gellar.

"-oh and I suppose that's another ash snipe, isn't it? Welllll Miss Sassypants, you've soooo got another thing coming... let me tell you where you can shove that coffin of yours..." Paris continued to berate the woman on the other end of the line.

Rory dumped the pile of flyers on the couch and fled the lounge to her own room in hopes of not having to know exactly where Paris' threats were going to be shoved.

Most of her things were still packed away after having moved from the first-year dormitories but her essentials were at hand; her cell phone, an assortment of clothing packed, to some extent, neatly in an open suitcase, her laptop on an old mahogany desk and various lip-glosses scattered beside it.

She fell backward, free-falling the last metre, to her bed and sank comfortably on the mattress. She starred at the ceiling for a moment, trying to blank the boy's face from her mind and replace it with something more aesthetically pleasing.

For a moment she was left with a picture of Asher Fleming but quick thinking and a shake of the head cleared any remaining trace of that thought. Dean then shone on through. Smiling casually and easily.

That was better, she thought. Much, much better.

Paris burst in, "can you believe this Rory? Can you freakin' believe this? She put me on hold. Of all the things she could do, she put me on hold!" she wailed, before removing the small telephonic device from her ear and pressing a button.

Rory sat up and examined the distressed girl in her doorway.

"I can't take this Rory," she continued, "what am I supposed to do from now on? Am I supposed to keep loving him? Do I turn him into ash? Do I- do I-" but her words trailed off into incomprehensible self-banter as she sank to her knees and cried sorrowfully.

Rory slinked down onto the ground and embraced her friend. Totally unsure of what she was supposed to say, she did what she thought any friend would do.

Paris reciprocated, throwing her arms around her and weeping without remorse.

As much as Rory had had few, truly physical gestures to convey emotion with Paris, she felt her mind wander again, back outside where she had been with the boy. As she held Paris and attempted to soothe her, all she could think of, was his touch.

She shook her thoughts off and continued to calm Paris.

A/N: Well, providing the consensus is that I should go with it; I'll try and get another chapter up tomorrow :) Cheers all.