A/N: This chapter is a prologue to the main story describing the OC, but it's not necessary to read this chapter if you're put off that the canon characters aren't seen in this chapter. (If this is the case, skip this chapter and read the chapter after this one first. You can always read this one later.)
Rain pelted down from dark, ominous storm clouds shrouding the sky from the earth below, soaking the land with puddles and mud. Night descended early today because of the storm, encasing the city in darkness and rendering the busyness of a weekend night motionless, except for one lone person running through the empty wet streets hurriedly.
Dressed in a trench coat too large for her, with many more layers of clothing underneath as revealed by the bumpiness of the coat, her shoes, holey and mud covered about a size or two too large, the person, a girl, fifteen years old, ran down the road checking behind her every now and then, rushing as though trying to lose someone who followed her. Though her body moved quickly, intent on her purpose, her blue eyes showed the weariness that comes from living a harsh, cruel life, experiencing life's terrible limits, and enduring it all unbreakably but ending up scarred to the bone.
Turning onto an alley, not slowing down even a fraction, the girl continued on, the pouring rain drenching her through each layer of worn and tattered clothing, one of her shoes becoming loose and falling off her foot—she didn't notice, since the shoe's bottom were so worn out and holey that it made no difference. Across the blacktop off the alley, stones and glass slivers littering the ground, she ran not minding or even noticing the scratches and cuts forming on her already scarred and blistered foot, with the toenails chewed down low enough to bleed.
No, she couldn't mind or even check on her foot, not when someone needed her desperately, that would be selfish, since she had promised she'd take care of that someone and that person would do the same for her. So she didn't stop until she reached the outside entrance into a basement, the cellar doors twisted and broken from their hinges, the steps leading down drenched and rough, some broken to pieces. The entrance to home.
"Meimuko? I'm back, I've brought food." The girl whispered, not to keep silent but because her voice was shot from a cold she'd had for three days, now aggravated by the run through the rain, but she didn't care. Meimuko needed food, that's all that mattered, that's all she cared about.
"K-Lyn? K-Lyn? That you? Please tell me it's you." A frightened voice called from the dark corner of the room, pathetic and weak.
"Yes, it's me, it's me. You'll be all right, I'm here." The girl, K-Lyn, replied stepping into the darkness, taking out of her pockets cans and packages of food and placing them on a rickety and ragged table beside a kerosene lantern that had dimmed down to nothing. Filling the lantern, K-Lyn lit it, blinking rapidly until her eyes got used to the brightness, then turning to look at Meimuko, a girlish woman, skin and bones, shivering under a woolen blanket, sweaty with fever, looking at K-Lyn with weary but hopeful brown eyes.
"It's raining…I'm cold…." Meimuko whispered tears falling from her eyes, then a coughing fit struck her, and K-Lyn found another blanket in the room and wrapped Meimuko up with it.
"Should I sing you a song?" K-Lyn whispered, smiling, weak but sweetly at Meimuko, holding her in her arms that were just as thin and weak as Meimuko's.
"But your voice, it's strained enough from your cold. And you've already went to get food for me, in this horrible weather. You do too much."
"Nonsense, you're sicker than I am, so you're my number one priority.' K-Lyn cooed, and began humming a melody, cut off when Meimuko put her fingers on her lips.
"But I'm older; I should be responsible for you."
"Age doesn't matter when you're sick."
"But I'm twenty-five. I should be taking care of you." Meimuko replied tears welling up in her eyes, her pale lips trembling as she struggled to give K-Lyn one of her blankets. "And you're all wet, running out in the rain like that when you're sick; I couldn't live with myself if you came down any sicker than you are just to take care of me."
"But you're too sick yourself. Besides, I've brought aspirin for you to take; it'll lower your fever." K-Lyn replied, handing Meimuko the vial.
"You should take some as well, there's enough here." Meimuko took two and gave the vial back to K-Lyn, eyeing the food hungrily and curiously. "Is there a receipt?"
"No." K-Lyn replied, opening a can of baked beans with a gleaming pocket knife, and then passing it to Meimuko.
"You shouldn't steal."
"But we need the food and medicine."
"…I feel so terrible, you having to steal just to feed me. If I weren't around you'd never have to worry. Maybe it'd be better if I was dead…."
"No! Don't even think that! Even if I never met you I'd still be homeless, and I'd probably be helping someone else just like you. Besides, without you, where would I find the motivation to continue living myself?"
"…K-Lyn…." Meimuko clung to K-Lyn trembling, tears pouring from her eyes like the rain outside. "You're so good to me, I'm sorry."
"No need to apologize, just rest." K-Lyn whispered humming a soft lullaby until the youthful woman fell asleep, shivering even in sleep.
The next morning, sunlight shining through the open cellar door, warming the inside of the basement, K-Lyn awoke, sweaty and feverish, trembling as she lay next to the sitting Meimuko, wrapped in the blankets the woman was wrapped with the night before.
"Meimuko? Your cold, you need these blankets more than I do."
"I'm sorry, K-Lyn." Meimuko spoke tears falling from her eyes. "I had to do it."
"What? Meimuko? What is it?" K-Lyn asked, sitting up, barely aware that someone else stood by the steps of the cellar. "Huh?"
"Is this the girl?" The person, a man dressed in a clean and neat shirt and blue jeans asked Meimuko, glancing at K-Lyn.
"Yes." Meimuko replied, avoiding K-Lyn's eyes as the girl looked from the woman to the man.
"Meimuko, what…?"
"Miss K-Lyn, I'm from child protective services, and am here to take you to a new home." The man spoke stepping up to K-Lyn, who winced like she'd been struck.
"What? Meimuko…what?"
"I'm sorry, K-Lyn. I'm so sorry, but I couldn't bear to see you struggle for me."
"Meimuko…but…." K-Lyn mumbled tears falling from her eyes as the man led her out of the basement, trembling from fear and cold. "How could you?"
"I'm sorry, K-Lyn, I'm so sorry."
"But how could you?" K-Lyn whispered remembering that day when Meimuko gave her over to the child protective services man, remembering how he brought her to an orphanage in Domino City where she was the oldest child and where they kept a close watch on her. For the first few weeks she wasn't allowed outside without an adult present—the risk that she'd run away was too high.
However, as soon as the security around her was lifted, she bolted, running away from the orphanage without looking back, yearning to make it back to her old haunts, but that would be impossible—they were in a different city. She was in a new place, with no knowledge of where anything was, wandering around aimlessly, when she stumbled onto the sight of a familiar skyscraper reaching for the clouds.
Staring intently at the skyscraper, face stoic, eyes gleaming from suppressed anger—it had been five years since she saw this building, five years since she felt the hatred burn through her from within drowning out all happiness and light. Now that hatred came back full-blown, drowning her in a sea of shadow and suppressed memories—how she abhorred the very sight of that building and the very name of the family who owned it— the name she should've been born with.
"Kaiba."