Chapter 1:

Seto Kaiba sat in the homeroom working away on his laptop when Kia walked in. The room was set up so that the desks were aligned in twos parrallel to the door. The teacher's desk was at the top of the room, facing the thirty other desks in the room. There were three columns and five rows of seats. Each desk had it's varnish chipped or tarnished in some way and every seat's cushion had been ripped off. Kia sighed at the sorry sight, but it was a palace compared to the orphange. She took her seat beside the window and proceded to take her book out of her bag. No sooner had she the novel in her hand, Yugi and his group walked into the room. Joey ran over to her straight away.

"Kia!" He yelled at her on his way over. She rolled her eyes and muttered something in Irish to herself, before she turned to face them all.

"Morning guys" was her reply. She smirked at Yugi, she tolerated him the best.

"You're still studying that Irish mumbo-jumbo, aren't you?" Tristan asked her. Kia nodded enthusiastically.

"I have roots in Ireland, of course I'd want to learn their culture and the language" she explained. Yugi and Téa nodded, while Joey and Tristan looked somewhat confused.

"So anyway Kia..." Tristan began to talk again. She turned toward him. "I heard that an Irish movie has come to Domino City, perhaps you'd like to..."

"No, thank you Tristan" she refused the offer while putting her hand up in objection. Across the room, Kaiba's laptop sat untouched for some-time upon the table, his hands suspended slightly above the keys, as he listened into their conversation. He couldn't call it eavesdropping, they were talking so loud that the juniors downstairs probably heard Kia's life-story too. Tristan was highly offended.

"I don't feel up for a movie with a friend right now..." she justified and looked down at her desk. Kaiba smirked when he saw Trisan's face drop at the word 'friend'. Joey, however, began moving toward the seat next to her. He opened his mouth as he reached for the chair.

"How 'bout going ou' with me? And not as friends..." he suggested cheesily. His hand nearly touched the chair as Kia answered him.

"No Joey, I don't feel like dating eith..." she trailed off as the chair beside her was whipped backwards and Kaiba's lean body appeared there.

"Wha' you doing 'ere Kaiba?" Joey snarled angrily, put out that Kaiba had snagged the seat before he got there. "This is a high school Mutt, I have to come here every day, unfortunately" Kaiba snapped back, giving him one of his infamous glares and then turning to Kia.

"You know Irish?" He queried. Kia nodded, slightly confused. "I want to offer you a private-tutoring position with my younger brother, provided that you are competant enough to teach him about Ireland and its language" he continued. Kia was shocked. Téa spoke up.

"What a curious offer. Why would Mokuba need to know Irish Kaiba?" she turned her head to the side as she talked.

"The future of Kaiba Corp. will be in his capable hands one day. It helps to know more than two languages when dealing internationally" he explained, without turning away from Kia. She cocked her head to the side.

"Might I ask how much money you'd be offering me?" she mumbled. Since the two dweebs had asked her out, Kaiba had noticed her uncomfortable posture.

"Depends on how well you teach him" Kaiba replied with a smirk. Yugi thought this strange. Throughout this entire ordeal, he had kept his thoughts to himself. Now he noticed that Kaiba was definately not himself.

"Alright, I accept your offer" she smirked back at him. "When do I start?"

"How does tomorrow evening sound?" Kaiba queried. Kia smiled a small smile.

"I'm looking forward to it" she mumbled. Kaiba smirked triumphantly. From across the room, Ryou Bakura watched the entire ordeal and wondered how he could manipulate her feeble mind now that she would be over at Kaiba's mansion. He gritted his teeth. 'My plan will take longer to execute than I had originally planned...' He thought in anger. The class bell rang just then and the rest of the students in the room scrambled to find a seat. Kaiba stayed in the seat beside Kia, much to her surprise. Bakura was infuriated. Yugi passed a note to Kia.

"Did you notice Kaiba's weird behaviour?" It read. Kia looked at it, confused for a moment. She scribbled back regardless and passed it back over to Yugi, trying to be careful and not let Kaiba see. Unfortunately, he did see it and smirked when he read Yugi's comment. But Kia's reply had him snickering quietly away to himself.

"Not at all. I was surprised by his offer to be quite honest Yugi but apart from that, he seemed like his normal self ;) " Yugi puzzled over this reply until the bell at the end of class rang out. The most puzzling thing about the reply was the winky smiley face at the end. At the break in the lesson, Yugi walked back over to Kia and Kaiba's desk. Kaiba was working away on his laptop as per usual, so Yugi thought it was the best time to ask Kia what she had meant.

"Your reply was confusing... " He began to say in a hushed whisper. Kia covered his mouth with her hand and whispered back at him.

"Cut me some slack Yugi, I've been here for six months and I barely know the guy" She reasoned. He nodded in approval.

"I see..." was all he could say. She laughed at his uncertainty.

After school, she walked home alone. From the school, it took her about forty minutes to walk down to the desolate building. Of the three windows at the front of the building, two were boarded up and the red-bricks were falling out of the walls like teeth. It was a dreary place to live, but it was her only place to live.

The building was divided into the ground-floor and first-floor, the ground floor having a living room, a small kitchen (where she spent most of her time after school) and a dining room. The second floor had all the dorm rooms and Kia's small private room. Unbeknownst to the younger children, the owner of the orphanage had a small attic room where she had her privacy from the children. Nobody but Kia knew of that secret room, and occassionally if she felt low, she was allowed to go up there for a while to read in peace.

All of the ground floor rooms were bare, with cheap wooden panelling on the walls and floors, a cheap TV set in the living room and old moldy beanbags to sit on. The old armchair in the room was only used by Ms Greene, the elderly orphanage owner who could barely stand anymore. The kitchen was cornered off from the living room by half a plasterboard wall and kept a small fridge, cooker and wooden countertop. It wasn't very hygienic and Kia was surprised at the government's lack of response to these conditions. The dining room had a small wooden table and seven rickety chairs, a definate health hazard for those who sat in them.

She entered through the remains of the front door and made her way into her room. In one corner there was a small bed, and in the other there was a small desk for her homework. Despite the fact that she had been living there for ten years, the desk and bed were in bad shape from mis-use. The old pine frames were chipped or scored and the bed itself creeked with the tiniest movement. She had a small trunk where she kept all her possessions, including her clothes, at the end of the bed. She changed into a red t-shirt and black jeans before going back downstairs to cook the dinner for the eleven children staying there.