AN: Okay so this is my first ever fanfic and this is just a little prologue I had in my head for a few days. I need to figure out some more of the plot and where I want this story to lead. Any input and comments are greatly appreciated as my little experience can tell you.

How can silence, an entity which is entirely nothing, suffocate you until you fear you may never breathe again? How can it wrap around you and squeeze so tightly you swear you can feel it tugging at your flesh?

One small girl pondered these thoughts with her head thrust inside a book. She couldn't read well, the words were just squiggles on the page to her, but she took comfort in gazing at the pictures and imagining she could hear the sounds they made. The cat purring in front of the fireplace, the dog growling from its' kennel. Her mind wasn't so silent with these sounds she pretended to hear. But always, always, the sounds of the real world lapped at her ears.

Glancing up she saw the other children in her class running around gleefully and shouting to one another. She could just hear the yells, though they sounded like hushed talking to her. One child ran past her, the billowing of her blonde hair the only indicator she had, and she turned panicked in his direction. He looked strangely at her and said something. She saw his lips move too quick to follow but no words reacher her, only a gentle hissing to tell her he was speaking. She pressed her lips together in frustration and threw her head back into her book, her breaths rapid.

Is this what it would always be like? To be tortured with the shushes of syllables but always unable to hear them? She supposed it would be. It was like living underwater, staring at the world through a wall of water. Her ears were too full to hear any words, the water pushing in on her from all sides. And every breath she took she feared would be her last as she drifted underneath the water, close to the surface but too far away to break it…

She sat upright with a gasp, the sheets desperately trying to drag her back down. She struggled with them momentarily before freeing herself, the sheets falling with a soft swoosh to the floor. The sound was lost on the girl.

She quickly turned to the side and began clawing at her bedside table. Her hands grasped something and she held on tightly, pushing the thing towards her ear with so much force it hurt. After a little fiddling, her erratic heartbeat and gasping breaths could be heard, as well as the music from her phone that was playing quite loudly for this time of night.

She fell back down onto her bed with a sigh, content to know she could hear the quiet noise that escaped her lips. Her hair was sticking to her forehead and the back of her neck, sweat forming the perfect bond between hair and skin. She knew she would need a shower before she started her first day at Domino High the next day, or rather, later into this day. The late time was not lost on her, but her heart ceased to stop its maddening beating.

Calm down, Elizabeth. She told herself sternly, surprised when she used her first name. She hated it and much prefered any other nickname. It's not like that any more, you can hear now. Her hand fluttered up to touch her left ear which her hearing aid resided behind, a clear thin wire snaking up and around her ear to sit inside her ear canal. It was almost invisible… almost. She was glad once again for her curly frizzy hair that shielded the worlds view from it.

At her old school it was just accepted that she was partially deaf and no one had ever made a big deal out of it. People asked her questions and asked to see her hearing aid, but there was never any judgement, never any weird stares. Her stomach twisted at the thought of never being back there. Her despair over her situation turned to anger as she thought of her mother, the reason for being stuck here in Japan in the first place.

Stupid woman, Elizabeth thought bitterly, a scowl on her lips. She was all but famous in Paris, people threw money at her to design buildings for them. As Elizabeth thought it over she realised she had someone else to curse as well.

Stupid Seto Kaiba. Why did he ever have to commission my mum to design the hotels at his stupid theme park anyway? Couldn't he have found someone else, anyone else? Can't I be happy for once in my life?

With a start Elizabeth realised she was close to tears. She pawed furiously at her eyes. She would not cry for them, no way. A tear will never be shed again over her mother. She had done enough crying as a child to last a lifetime.