A/N: I'd like to note that I do NOT own Ed, Edd, n Eddy, or "Faust", by Goethe. If I did, I wouldn't be posting this here, am I right? Ha ha! *cricket*

... Right. On with the story. Characters are modeled after VampireMeerkat's designs of them in high school, found in her gallery:

Enjoy!

-X-X-X-X-X-X

Chapter 1:

Edd was a model student, as anyone would tell you with a roll of their eyes. It was irritating to them how smart he was, how responsible he was, yet how nice he was about the whole deal. He excelled at mathematics, at the sciences, at history… even in Literature class, he could always find an interesting fact to share with his class, some of which even looked up from their cell phones to listen.

He wasn't the most popular young man around. No, no, in a high school like Peach Creek High, smarts count for very little. And while he was far from unattractive (letting down his long black hair from under his ski hat had made him surprisingly successful with several young ladies, for one), his skinny, scholarly build was far from the muscular one that most women his age seemed to prefer. He didn't really mind, for the most part. Girls, he'd discovered, were a particularly powerful source of distraction from one's studies. Something that simply wouldn't do.

The only constants in his social life were his two best friends. Eddy had undergone an extreme growth spurt a year before, and was now actually taller than Ed. He was still the scamming, greedy man that he was before, but he went about it a little more intelligently now. Ed had hardly changed at all, aside from the fact that he needed glasses now. All those monster movies had finally caught up with him.

And there were, of course, the Kankers… They'd grown up too, in a manner of speaking. They were much less direct about their methods now. At least, he thought, Marie was. He hardly ever stayed around long enough to find out whether Lee or May had switched tactics. Instead of peppering him with lipstick marks like she did four years ago, Marie would hang near a corner and wait for him to come by, then yank him over and make out forcefully with him in full view of everybody, for example. That was a preferred method of hers. It happened less often nowadays, but whenever she crossed eyes with Edd, she'd grin lasciviously and wink at him, or make even more suggestive gestures at him, which had led to him avoiding her gaze whenever possible.

She'd probably changed the most out of her sisters. She'd let her hair grow out a little, turning it from a small mess on her head into a veritable mane falling to her mid-back, but still hiding her right eye from sight. It gave her a somewhat feral, dangerous look, one which her oversized brown jacket did nothing to mitigate. This was a cultivated appearance, he knew, designed to lure him in. Its success was debatable, since many people considered her to be rather pretty nowadays. Yet another reason to ignore her as best as he could.

A feat that was somewhat impossible, he'd recently discovered, when she sat right behind him in Literature class, propped up her feet on the head of his seat, nudging his upper back uncomfortably by it (and getting his father's old shirt dirty in the process, he was sure!), while she chewed her gum and stared intently at the back of his head. He stared straight ahead in this class and did his best to ignore the whispered suggestions that came from behind him, while at the same time take notes on the class. Unfortunately, Edd was never too good at multitasking, and oftentimes fell behind in this class.

Which, he supposed, was why the teacher had nominated him to be the protagonist at their rendition of Goethe's Faust for that season's play.

"W-wait a minute, please!" he cried, standing up with a somewhat panicked look on his face. The teacher looked back at him, having stopped writing down his name in his list. "I-I haven't agreed to any of this!"

"C'mon, Double D!" the young man sitting next to him nudged him. "You fit the character perfectly!"

"Yeah, dude!" a blonde, extremely pretty girl turned in her seat to look at him with a dazzling smile. Edd felt himself melt when Nazz smiled at him like that. He'd harbored a secret crush on her for years, and sometimes got a strange vibe from her, almost like she was flirting with him. A crazy thought, he knew, since she was dating Kevin, the stereotypical school jock, but hey. He could dream, couldn't he? Apparently not, if the painful jab from Marie's boot to his back and increased aggression in the chewing of her gum was any indication.

"You're the smartest guy in the classroom, and are constantly looking to get smarter! That's, like, the entire character, right?" Nazz went on, once more flash ing those perfect teeth of hers at him. Everything about her was perfect, Edd mused to himself. By the time his senses came back to him, he realized he'd already said yes, and the rest of the class was currently in the middle of deciding who'd play Mephistopheles. He felt his heart sink.

"Oh, Eddward," he thought sorrowfully. "What did you get yourself into this time?"Behind him, Marie's eyes narrowed dangerously, and her bubblegum popped as she bit into it.

Half an hour later, the class filed out of the classroom, with Marie in a fouler mood than usual. She didn't even flirt audaciously with Edd, like she usually did, and she actually slammed somebody who was in her way into a locker, leaving a Johnny-shaped dent in it and making Edd wince. He could understand why she was angry, but couldn't really sympathize with her. After all, she was only mad that Nazz had gotten picked over her for Helena, Faust's love interest in their play. Of course, that meant simply that Double D had been spared having to give her a kiss on-stage, a kiss that would undoubtedly have turned into a one-way make out session in front of everybody. Besides, now he got to kiss Nazz, at… he flipped quickly through the script… Act two, scene four. Edd was ecstatic at the thought. His childhood crush, kissing him!

Grinning widely, the gap between his teeth on display for all to see, Edd all but skipped to the cafeteria.

"C'mon, Sockhead!" Eddy complained, snapping his fingers in front of the smart Ed's face. "You're not even paying attention, man!" Edd shook his head.

"My sincerest apologies, Eddy… I simply am rather happy about a situation that arose recently in Literature class!"

"Oh, man. What is it THIS time, egghead?" Eddy rolled his eyes, eliciting a frown from his friend.

"Well, Eddy, I'll have you know that 'this time', I got chosen to be the protagonist in the school play! It's a very prestigious position, and-"

"You're gonna be in the play? Lame. That thing's for babies and dweebs," Eddy complained, poking into the contents of his plate with his fork. "I swear this thing's BREATHING…" he muttered in disgust.

"You gonna eat that, Eddy?" Ed asked, pointing at the slightly heaving 'sandwich'.

"Knock yourself out, lumpy," Eddy answered, pushing the plate towards his voracious, unhygienic friend. His eyes widened when Ed descended on the meal with unrivaled savagery.

"… I think I saw something like this on the Animal Planet once," he mentioned to Edd, who had wrinkled his nose at this less intelligent friend's unrelenting hunger.

"Yes, well, as I was saying…" Edd coughed into his hand and held out the script to Eddy, who took it with a bored expression on his face.

"Faust? Ain't that the dude who sold his soul to Old Scratch? For books or chicks or some shit like that?" he asked, vaguely remembering the exam he'd copied a few months before. Who said you didn't learn anything in school?

"There are several versions floating around, Eddy. But I would rather like to direct your attention to page 23, if you will," Edd suggested, stippling his fingers in front of him and hiding an uncharacteristic and (in his eyes, at least) unsightly smirk. Eddy raised an eyebrow and did as his sock-headed friend suggested.

"Alright, so you get to make out with whoever's playing this Helena chick. What, you so desperate for some tail you'll kiss any actress wannabe?" Eddy asked, grinning. To his surprise, Edd didn't splutter or blush as he usually did at comments like this. In fact, his grin was even wider than Eddy's.

"Well, my good sir, I feel like I must inform you that the girl playing Helena is, in fact, our beloved cheerleader, Nazz." For once in his life, Edd felt like laughing out loud at the expression on Eddy's face. It was a strange breed of disbelief, shock, and suspicion.

"Nazz is playing Helena?"

"Yep."

"And you're playing Faust?"

"That is correct, yes."

"Then that means that you…"

"Indeed."

"And her…"

"I believe we already established what will happen during Act Two, scene four, Eddy."

Eddy was silent for a moment, before bursting out into a grin and catching Edd in a headlock.

"Sockhead, you sly dog!" he laughed, giving his friend a noogie. "You totally got into it after she did just to kiss her, dint'cha?"

"Why, I never!" Edd responded in mock indignation.

As the two continued to laugh and bicker playfully, with Eddy postulating increasingly more ridiculous theories about why Edd would join the school play, and eventually even came up with a scam revolving around this, neither considered a very real hazard that had been created during Literature class for the lovable little genius.

A few hours later, in the abandoned gym, the actors started practicing their lines. Being the first day of this, it was merely a senseless cacophony of voices yelping out their lines. Johnny tried his best to get Wagner's lines right while arguing with Plank about whether his delivery was the correct one. Rolf tried his hardest to correctly deliver Mephistopheles's chilling dialogue without veering off course, but somehow his speech dismissing Faust's worries invariably ended up as a dissertation on the qualities of onions over turnips.

"Rolf does not understand why this horn-headed goat-man doesn't refer to the Great Onion War of '67 to validate his point!" he cried, slapping the script with the back of his hand. Edd did his best to ignore him as he memorized his own lines. It was, of course, a dumbed-down version of the original text, with many pop culture references thrown in. A complete butchery, in Edd's opinion.

Eventually, Rolf's rambling became too much for him to handle, and he moved discreetly to the benches on the far side of the gym. He would've taken the ones closer by, but… well, a very sullen Marie had apparently decided to crash the party, so to speak. She was currently sitting quietly at the bench, listening to something on her headphones, and glaring murderously at Nazz as the blonde practiced her acting. If looks could kill, the cheerleader would currently be splattered all over the wall, Edd thought.

"Surely she wouldn't try to jump me in front of these many people, right?" he murmured, looking back down at his script. "What am I saying, of course she would… so why isn't she?" He glanced back up. She was plotting something, he was certain of it. He reluctantly looked back down at his text, expecting a smooch attack that never came. Instead, he became engrossed in the subpar text, and soon came across his first major obstacle. He didn't understand his motivation.

"Really," he muttered crossly, "why would someone hand over something as valuable as their soul and integrity over something that could be achieved through hard work at his library or laboratory!" He spent several more minutes trying to figure out Faust's reasoning, wracking his brain for a situation in which he would gladly have bartered with an obviously evil figure in exchange for knowledge or protection. While several close shaves with the Kankers came to mind immediately, none of them would really have justified selling his soul.

"Hey, Double D. How you holding up?" Edd snapped out of his thoughts and whipped around, his long hair cracking like a whip neatly across the newcomer's face.

After the boy regained consciousness and Edd had stopped apologizing, he finally got on to talking.

"So… You gonna kiss Nazz, huh?" he said, elbowing Edd's ribs and grinning widely. Edd turned bright red and coughed into his hand.

"Yes, well… I do this for the art, because-"

"For the art, my balls. You just wanna get lucky with Blondie over there, am I right?" Edd frowned at the crassness of his colleague.

"Why, I never!" he said indignantly. The other kid just lifted his hands defensively.

"Just joking, man. Seriously, though? Watch your back. I heard Kevin at lunch say he's gonna pound your face in." Edd started to answer, and then went very pale as his brain registered what had been said.

"E-Excuse me?" he asked, suddenly very, very frightened for himself and hoping he'd misheard.

"Kevin, man. He was looking all over for you, yelling about how the only guy that makes out with his girl is him. He was even saying he was gonna baptize his iron knuckles with your blood."

"Oh, dear…"

"Yeah, dude." The two sat in solemn silence for a couple of minutes. Then the other guy brightened up, patted Edd on the shoulder happily, and walked away as if he hadn't just told someone else of their impending funeral. Edd, on the other hand, could not stop thinking panicky, bloodcurdling thoughts. What would Kevin do to him?! Edd knew how he got about Nazz. The man was paranoid and overprotective! He got into fights over the smallest mean look at her! What would he DO to a guy who planned on kissing her?!

"Oh, how I rue the moment I said yes to this foolish venture!" he cried out loud, but nobody seemed to hear him. "Now what will I do to save my miserable hide?!"

His mind raced with possibilities. The first thing that came to his mind was running.

"No, that won't work. I wouldn't know where to hide. Besides, Kevin would probably track me down in that infernal bicycle of his…"

The second option was fighting back, which he immediately discarded. He wasn't the weakling he used to be, but Kevin was still a fair bit stronger than he could ever hope to be, and undoubtedly had more fights under his belt than Edd.

The third option was getting somebody to protect him. Hire an even bigger jock, perhaps.

"No, no… Kevin has repeatedly demonstrated he doesn't fear many things. As a matter of fact, the only things I've seen him afraid of are Eddy's brother and-" his eyes widened. No. No, no, no. Not happening. "- the Kankers."He groaned, loudly. They were his best shot- no, they were his ONLY shot- at walking away from this unscathed, but he was still understandably wary of dealing with them. To do so would mean he'd be giving up his integrity, his values, his very beliefs! All for the sake of protection, which he could attain through hard work at the gym?!

… There was no contest, really.

"Well, at least I'm over one obstacle…" he thought as he took a deep breath and headed for Marie, feeling like he walked straight to his funeral. "At least now I can understand Faust's motivation."

-X-X-X-X-X-X

A/N: Whoo! Had this idea in my head for quite a of the important parts are written out in my head, but a few holes are still around here and there, so please bear with me if updates get a little slow. Reviews are ALWAYS appreciated, and please, feel free to critique! I wanna get better, so you guys can enjoy this, and at this point any criticism is good criticism. Thanks!