I apologize for short chapters. They will lengthen in time. I think.

Unfortunately, summer did end. The peace of daylight can only last so long, and nothing could stop the first day of school. Kaiba would lose hours in his working day. Yugi and his friends would lose hours of free time. None were too happy about it, but it was required to go to school, so to school they went.

They found there a surprise. For the school year, there was a new face in their class. She seemed familiar to them, but none could quite place it. It couldn't be possible – for sure, they have never seen her before.

Her skin was white as porcelain; her hair, long and dark red; her eyes, darting and pale blue. Her bangs were cut just above her fine eyebrows, and lengthened to a point at her ears. Her hair was swept up and knotted into a high ponytail without aid of a band. Her nose was pointed, her face square. She looked out of place in the rather preppy school uniform of Domino High, and she proved it by wearing silver skull earrings with red crystal eyes. Around her ankle rested a gold snake ring that swallowed its own tail.

She sat in the corner and sulked. A dark cloud of dismay hovered around her and warded off friendly people. Yugi was one of those friendly people, and kept his distance. Kaiba, however, didn't care, and sat just one seat away. Feeling eyes on him, Kaiba's dark blue eyes flitted towards that new face. As suspected, she was staring at him. As expected, Kaiba didn't care – people stared all the time.

There was something unsettling about her gaze that he only just managed to ignore. The teacher soon walked in, however, and began roll call after introducing himself as Mr. Takahashi. When the teacher called "Kaiba Seto," he answered. After him, the new face answered to "Kikuchi Svana." So that was her name. First name, Svana; last name Kikuchi.

Roll call finished, and Mr. Takahashi assigned them seats. He favored a pattern of boy-girl-boy-girl, and seated them thus. Kaiba found that the new face was seated directly to his left; to his right sat a girl he didn't remember. On the other side of the new face was Jounouchi. Jou was slightly deterred by the girl's dark gloom, but he didn't want to leave without saying hi, and God be darned if he was going to be scared! So he turned to her and said, "Hi. I'm Jounouchi."

She glanced at him from under her dark lashes. "Svana."

Jou grinned. "Nice to meet ya!" He turned back to face front only to say, "Hey, what happened to my pencil?"

"Maybe it rolled off the desk," the new girl suggested. For the next five minutes, Jou was bending and leaning in his seat to try and see where his pencil might have rolled to. Upon straightening in his seat empty-handed, he finally got out a new one.

Minutes later, Kaiba discovered a pencil that was not his on his desk.

Svana walked away from the school, staring at a map of Domino City. She wasn't really reading it, though, for her thoughts encased her. She didn't really want to go to a school – not now, anyway. But Child Services wouldn't let her skip it. And these uniforms were hideous and probably designed by a pervert.

She very nearly walked into a blond she recognized. She stopped just in time, but Jou pulled the map down so he could see it. "So where ya headed, Svana?" he asked in a friendly manner.

Svana jerked the map away from him, folded it up, and put it in her bookbag. "None of your business, Blondie." She pushed past him and marched down the sidewalk, away from the school. Yugi, Honda, and Anzu joined up with Jou.

"She's one cold lady," he said to his friends. "What's her problem?"

"Maybe she's just shy," Yugi suggested. "Tomorrow, why don't we invite her to play Duel Monsters with us?"

"Is that the answer to everything?" Anzu asked in exasperation.

"That and video games!" Yugi happily replied. The group laughed in good mood. It was, of course, soured by the arrival of Kaiba. He glared down at them.

"Good luck with that," he sneered. He, too, passed the group, but not before thrusting a long, thin object into Jou's hand.

Kaiba was a safe distance away by the time Jou exclaimed, "You had my pencil the entire time!"

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