Jewels: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh!

AKAI'S POV

"Krystal!" I yelled running into her house, "Krystal where are you?" I heard a door close upstairs and ran up checking every room until I found Krystal in here room. "There you are, I…" I stopped when I saw all the papers all over the room, "What's all this?" I started to pick up the papers and looked at them.

"Can you believe it…I finished the book yesterday, worked all day and all through the night," she said with a shaky voice, "So I printed it out and was going to send it to you…but I decided to read it over first, the first ten chapters are great, but the rest…its horrible."

"So you got angry and threw the papers everywhere?" I questioned, "Krystal…what the hell happened yesterday?"

She put a hand on her arm and looked away from me. "He found out…"

"What?" I questioned.

"He…our hands touched and I guess he had some type of flashback or something, because next thing I knew he was yelling at me and…" she stopped and looked away.

I went and sat next to her on the bed. "Why are you hiding your arm?"

KRYSTAL'S POV

"I um…" I started and looked away from him. I didn't want to show him the hand print shaped bruise that had formed on my arm. He was my manager, but he always said that he always put our friendship first…and if he saw the bruise he would be pissed off.

"Krystal…" he said.

"He was just angry, and I lied to him and what Uncle Max did to him and Mokuba, stealing their souls and locking them away…he has every right to be angry, he didn't mean it," I said.

He quickly removed my hand from my arm and looked at it. "Why didn't you call me last night?" he questioned once he saw the bruise.

"I can handle it…I just wanted to get home," I replied, "And Kaiba wanted me out of his sight, and out of his mansion…so I came home. I'm fine though…"

He stood up and looked a little shocked. "Obviously you're not! You don't cry, and don't tell me you weren't because your eyes are red, you don't just throw things around, and you definitely don't second guess yourself!"

I got up and pushed him out of the way and made my way and made my way over to the window. "You just don't understand, Akai…you just can't."

It was quiet in the room for a moment before he finally spoke up. "I think I can…"

I looked over my shoulder at him and saw him looking at the papers he had picked up off the floor. "No…you can't…it's just too hard to explain-."

"He was only someone it hurt for you to look at because of what your Uncle did…but he was your muse…"

SETO'S POV

"So you eliminated Krystal?" Mokuba questioned.

"Not in so many words," I replied, leaning back in my chair and looking at her picture, "I more or less told her to get out of the mansion and out of my sight."

"What?!" Mokuba said, almost dropping his clipboard, "But according to my calculations she was most likely to win."

"She's related to Pegasus…"

"Come again?"

"The 'C' in K.C. McKinley, stands for Crawford…Krystal Crawford-McKinley, the unnamed Uncle that was mentioned in her file…is Pegasus."

"That's why she knows so much about Duel Monsters," he said, "Did you send you her home just because she was Pegasus's niece?"

"She was getting ready to help me fix my tie, and our hands touched and I had this vision…it was fuzzy, but I could tell where I was, I was that cell in the Duelist Kingdom dungeon and right in front of me was Krystal and she kept asking me questions, but I couldn't answer back."

"That was when Pegasus had our souls," Mokuba said, looking at the ground.

"He did not have our souls, Mokuba!" I snapped, "That's a bunch of hocus pocus…I don't know what he did, but he did not take our souls!"

"Well, whatever it was…what made you remember her?" he asked.

I closed my eyes. 'Soft brown eyes, I remember looking at me with such concern even though I was a complete stranger to her...and I remember that she touched my cheek, her hands are soft…' I thought before opening my eyes. "I don't know Mokuba…" I replied.

"Do you want me to bring her back to the mansion?" he questioned.

"No…" I replied, "I'll go to her…after what I did, it'd be better that way."

KRYSTAL'S POV

"What?" I questioned.

"The business man that you have in this…Kara's client, is described exactly like Kaiba," Akai replied.

I took the papers from him and read over them. "Why on earth would I…"

"People get inspiration from strange places…and people," he replied.

DING DONG

Akai walked over to the window and looked out and a rare scowl crossed his face. "I'll go check it."

As he left the room I walked over to the window and looked out to see a limo with a KC license plate. "Akai! Don't do anything stupid!" I called, following him down the stairs.

He got to the door before I could stop him and he came face-to-face with Kaiba.

"I shouldn't say I'm surprised, cause I'm not," Kaiba said, looking at him.

Akai balled his fist. "You may be…" he stopped, not daring to tell Kaiba that he was my 'muse', "You have some nerve."

Kaiba was silent and just looked over Akai's shoulder at me, and believe it or not, his normal scowl was more of an apologetic look…or maybe at the time that was just my vulnerability.

"Let him in, Akai," I said, "He looks like he has something he needs to say to me."

"Let him in?! He hurt you!" Akai said.

Kaiba's eyes got wide and I looked away. "Just…let him in," I said.

Akai moved out of the way and Kaiba stepped into the house. "Is there somewhere private we can talk?"

I looked from him to Akai and back again before nodding. "Let's go out to the garden."

I led him out to the back yard and looked around. The roses were in full bloom, the birds were chirping, and koi in the pond were swimming happily in the sunlight. If I wasn't in such a lousy mood, maybe I could even enjoy such a beautiful day.

"I'm sorry…"

I turned my head slowly and looked at Kaiba like he had ten heads. "Excuse me?"

"I came here today to apologize to you…my actions yesterday were inexcusable, and I injured you and I'm sorry," he said.

'He actually means that…' I though still looking at him like he was nuts.

"I hope I didn't hurt you that bad," he said.

Instinctively I put my hand over my arm. "It's not that bad…"

He gently removed my hand from my arm and lifted up my sleeve and looked at the bruise, and after a minute of just staring at it he removed his hand, letting my sleeve fall back over the bruise.

"You were never eliminated from the competition," he said, trying to compose himself, "You may return to the mansion if you wish."

"That's not a good idea," I replied.

"I lost my temper yesterday and-," he started, but I held up my hand.

"Even if by some miracle I won, I don't know that I would want to be dating a man who's life if run by Duel Monsters," I said honestly, not knowing why I was starting to spill my guts to Kaiba of all people, "Uncle Max spent hours on end perfecting the game of Duel Monsters, painting the creatures, coming up with names, strategies, you name it he spent hours doing it and though he did spend time with me, I don't know how many times I was told "later", "not now", "don't bother me"."

He just stared me.

"I don't want that again…and if you chose me you would have to think, did you chose me just because I'm Pegasus's niece and this could be good business? I will not be a pawn in a game."

"I would never-."

"And let's face it Kaiba, your track record with woman…not great," I finished.

He let out a chuckle. "When you have something to say, you really do say it, don't you?"

"Well I-," I started, only to get cut off.

"No…my track record isn't great with women, want to know why? Because you're all too damn clingy… "Seto spend more time with me", "Seto we need to go out more", "Seto I cleared you schedule so that we could go out today", or you think I'm some sort of goddamn checkbook, "Seto buy me this", "Seto buy me that", "I want this", "I want that"…When I look in the mirror in the morning I don't see Kaiba First National Bank scrawled across my forehead."

It was my turn to just stare at him.

"I work a lot cause I have a business to run, I have made sacrifices like not being able to spend time with my little brother, but I can finally find time to spend with him, and I will make sure that whoever I choose never feels second rate…"

"Kaiba…"

"As for using you to get to Pegasus or Industrial Illusions…how low do you think of me?"

I looked away from him and it was quiet for a few minutes. "I'll uh…actually get dressed."

"Why?" he questioned.

"I guess since the air is clear I can go back to the mansion…" I replied, still a little dumbfounded about what transpired.

"Just…hurry," he said before looking at his watch, "I have a meeting in fifteen minutes so you'll have to wait at Kaiba Corp."

I sighed. "Lovely…I can reflect on this mess."

TO BE CONTINUED…

Jewels: I hope you liked the chap!