hello! this is my first fan fiction! please r&r, i would love to hear your feedback! i own nothing but the plot. see end for notes. thanks! ~raz0r

Chapter I: One Step at a Time

She wasn't special in any way that she felt. Though she was tall for her age, and lean to an extreme with fair hair and eyes. But when she looked in the mirror, she never saw why her mother told her how special she was. All she saw was herself, what she had always been, and what she would always be: a freak. Her pallid skin was so light she had to wear sunscreen even in winter; moisture twice everyday and long gave up on finding a foundation that would match her. It wasn't an issue of her skin being too olive or too pink, rather it seemed the undertone was almost blue. Just like her eyes, almost too blue. Her adoptive mother told her that they were a clear sky, a perfect day; rain held in the clouds before it fell. But to her, they seemed like painted buttons on a doll from some scary movie, more artificial than endearing. And her hair, her security blanket, her way to hide from on-looking, eyes was near as pale as her skin, with the same odd blue tinge. It was white in good days, and shimmered periwinkle in sunlight.

The doctors said it wasn't albinism, or any form of vitiligo, that it was just an extremely uncommon genetic mutation probably carried down from her birth parents. They didn't have a name for it, and have never seen anything like it before. "A unique specimen," they had called her, and she would never forget that, or forgive it. Strangers cursed her forever with this abnormal appearance and social barrier. She had few friends, and fewer family. Her mother had adopted her as a baby, with no father figure, and no siblings, only an estranged aunt who only came to see them on holidays. It was rather hard for an already odd-looking outcast to find someone to pay attention to her, when those who were required to by blood were either non-existent or non relevant. Her own parents had given her up.

Kids would laugh at her on the playground. Ever since she could remember, they would call her names and single her out for her appearance, despite her best efforts at befriending them. It didn't matter how many times she changed schools, it was the same everywhere, and at all ages in one way or another. The laughing and name-calling may have stopped, but the discriminatory whispers and note passing ensued. The odd looks in the locker room, the way everyone avoided her glance. By now she was used to it, being the radioactive neon spark in the sea of normality that surrounded her.

She had two options, and only two options: get tough or give up. Her mother told her that no matter how people treated her to keep her head up. To keep her dignity and her pride and never retaliate. But that didn't work for her, not at any age or social situation. The mean drawings in her locker, the biohazard stickers slapped all over her gym bag, the graffiti on her mailbox. She learned to steel herself to it, to ignore and move on. Her skin hardened into marble, and she became a goddess above all of the nonsense. She became stone and sapphire unable to be touched by the words and actions of those around her. Her attitude began to reflect her inner workings, and no longer did she blush when people stared, she eyed them right back, daring them to say something. She was sharp as obsidian and hard as alabaster. She was an Alantian princess sunk deep into the sea, an alien explorer left on earth. She was Clark Kent, the last unicorn: Amalthea; she was Rei Ayanami, pilot of an evangelion. Books and movies were her friends, dreams were her lovers, she needed no one. She feared no one, no one would could or would touch her. Her bite was venom and the raging storm in her eyes breed white lightning to strike down her enemies. She was a goddess, a warrior a queen, and nothing less.

But when her mother died, three days before she was to start school at domino high, Kisara faltered. She stared at herself, naked as her name day in the mirror, criticizing every scar, each bruise, all the veins that stood out against translucent skin. Her ribs were too visible her muscles too lean, her eyes too big with dark blue bags under them from lack of sleep. She wished they were puffy, she wished that they were red, but no matter what the tears wouldn't come.

Mom couldn't really be gone, it just wasn't possible; she was so strong. She had raised her alone. Mom juggled two jobs when Kisara was really young, and then her career took off and she worked everyday at least eight hours into her mid sixties. There just wasn't a way that someone like her, someone as strong as mom could die. Minami Hayashi was a self-made woman, unstoppable, invincible. She was the one who had been Kisara's rock, her shoulder to cry on and her constant supporter. She whispered the soothing words into her ears when she had nightmares, held her hand while she taught her to cross the street safely, always reminding her not to look at her feet, to keep her head up. Keep your head up.

She was mom. And moms' don't die. They didn't leave their children. They don't abandon those who needed them still. It wasn't fair, it wasn't ok, it wasn't right. So anger filled the void of loss, and anger would not allow her tears.

Anger was an old friend, her default after years of learning to deal with the gawkers and the bullying. She became her heroines and heroes when she didn't give into sadness, and when she couldn't be her own hero, it was her paperbacks or laptop that comforted her. Learning was intoxicatingly easy for her, and soothing, something to think of other than her miserable blue existence. That's what lead her to creating, and what drew her at Domino High. They called her a prodigy, a visionary, or some other elaborate adjective that was more flattery than fact. It would have been easy for her to correct them on their usage of the words, but instead she smiled and accepted. The school wasn't too far, and their digital media production department was unrivaled in the east.

She wanted nothing more than to get into the field of game design, coding made sense to her and lulled her maternal need to fix things. Modeling soothed her unconscious longing for touch, the polygons making up for lack of human interaction. The emersion technology she was working on, a full "virtual dive system" would make her fantasy worlds a reality. No longer would her appearance seem so odd if she could build her own world. If she could get through school and build herself up, then she could hide behind the walls in her office for the rest of her carrer. In her hopeful future, she would have underlings to run errands and could work from home eventually. She would be rich, famous and utterly above the ever-present bullying. No one bullied rich people, and when she had enough money she could live without the rest of the world.

But first she had to climb the stairs, one by one. And each one was harder than the next, as trite as that sounded in her mind. High school, real high school. Not cram school, or testing out of classes, but real actual seven-thirty am to two-thirty pm five days a week with required courses and obscene uniforms high school. She shuddered at the thought, shaking herself out of her thoughts and pulled on her undergarments before putting the aforementioned tragedy of an outfit on.

Minami had been a fashion designer, which might have had an effect on her adopted daughter's love of design, or it could have been a mere coincidence. But what was for sure is that despite her odd coloring, Kisara was always well dressed. And pink was not her color. The azure blue pleated skirt was too short for her liking but the bowtie seemed to be the most offensive object, adding a clown-like contrast to the pink jacket as she clipped it under her collar. A clip on bowtie, she sneered inwardly. At least she could pick her own shoes, though it was hardly a saving grace for nothing could save knee high white socks. Glaring at her reflection in the mirror and trying not to focus on how the pink made her skin seem to glow with extra unearthly vigor, she chose some simple silver earrings and began to brush out her hair, snorting as it seemed to shine to spite her.

Grabbing her bag and keys she glanced down before heading out the door to catch the subway at this unholy hour of six in the morning, catching her mother's necklace out of the corner of her eye. She hesitantly ran a finger along the curved silver filigree dragon, wrapped around a shining blue stone. It rest where mom had left it, on the table near the door where they would unload change and purses, and kick shoes off beneath. Her mom had the necklace ever since she could remember, and whenever asked about it she simply responded it was a reminder of her daughter. Sure the temper fit her, but an alien or ghost would have been more appropriate, but much less fashionable. Despite herself, Kisara smiled, pulling herself back to reality and closing the door to the flat that now belonged to her. The walk to the elevator was quick, and she almost didn't feel the tears running down her face until the wind of the outside city struck her, chilling them instantly.

One step at a time, just like mother. Her knuckle nearly tore the fragile skin under her eyelids as she forced the tears away, not wanting her eye makeup to run.

One step at a time.

Thanks for reading! this is an A/U set after battle city with the intent to create a strong unique Kisara.