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Disclaimer: Don't own it.

Warnings: yaoi, character bashing, Yami/Seto, OOC

Note: Seto is the uke… or as I prefer calling it, the more submissive one. I didn't find a need to say that in the past chapters… ah, well, people need to know.

Oh, right, courtesy of Pegasus being the cooking teacher goes to Gin Ryu-chan. Her idea…

~

Kitchen Essentials

I got home, somewhat tired out from the events at cooking class… though I really didn't have a need to be. I mean, honestly… all we did was boil water.

Ra forbid I don't learn how to do that.

Immediately, I rushed upstairs, slammed the door to my room shut, chucked my schoolbag into a random corner and promptly collapsed face down on my bed.

Yugi walked in… I sensed it. Then, suddenly, I felt a cool stream of liquid soaking through my hair – abruptly I yelped, sat up, and glared. My oh so innocent hikari stood there with a bottle of water in his hand and a grin on his face.

I rubbed the back of my head. "What the hell was that for?"

He shrugged, sitting down beside me. "I figured you needed some waking up. So, how was cooking today?"

At that comment I plopped back down, face buried in my pillow. "Mpfh."

"What?"

I sat up. "Anzu got burnt."

Yugi nodded. "So I heard." Then, he grinned mischievously. "You're going to have fun this year, aren't you?"

I guess I had to smile at that. "If you're talking about a certain someone, then I suppose maybe. But if you're referring to Bakura, you are gravely mistaken."

Yugi simply laughed at that.

~

In the Kaiba household…

"Mokuba!" yelled one very disgruntled teen. "Come back here!"

Said boy giggled and ran even further away from his older brother. "Nyah ah! You have to catch me first Seto!"

Seto groaned. This chase had begun ever since he picked up his younger brother from school.

"Ok, you already blackmailed me to take cooking classes by stealing Obelisk. (1) I attended. Now can I please have my card back?" he shouted at the further retreating Mokuba.

"Like I said, you have to CATCH me!"

"Ugh… ok, fine, you asked for it!"

Seto, having both the height and speed advantage, managed to corner his younger brother in no time at all. Crossing his arms, he glared down at Mokuba, a stance he found particularly intimidating.

The boy looked up, gulped, and smiled sheepishly. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out the god card, still in perfect condition.

"Here."

Taking the card, he sighed. "Thank you."

Turning to walk away, he stopped in his tracks when Mokuba called back out. "Yes?"

Once again, the boy reached into his pocket, this time yanking out a deck of Duel Monster cards. "Did you honestly think I'd let you get away with this?" the boy said, devilish smile painted on his face. "Don't think I don't know you… you're only going to attend for one semester, right? Well, if you plan to get your deck back, you're going to have to go for the whole year!" With that, Mokuba cackled in a witchlike manner, and darted off before Seto had time to react.

Deciding to give up the chase, he walked up to his office, sinking down onto his chair. Banging his head multiple times on his desk, he muttered, "How the hell can you hate someone yet love them at the same time?"

If only you knew, Seto. You're going to find out very soon…

~

The sun rose, starting another torturous school day… today a torturous Tuesday morning. Going through my daily morning ritual, I washed up, dressed, packed, ate breakfast, and began that horribly boring trek to school with Yugi.

The school day crawled by… at the breakneck speed of a centimeter per hour. Aside from getting yelled at by the history teacher for being too loudmouthed (hey, what do you expect? They screwed up every aspect of the construction of the pyramids! Yes, we were doing world history), nothing too exciting happened.

And so, math class passed. So did language, geography, science, history, and every other class I took. And then came that dreaded hour again… cooking.

I'm making it sound like the apocalypse, aren't I?

But, anyways, I got there last, and as always, almost every seat at the front was taken… well, apparently Anzu had saved a seat for me. Not that I wanted to sit beside her, mind you… especially not in the front row either.

Although seeing as to it was the very last spot, I had to sit down…

Pegasus was late about a good five minutes, so the class had that time to themselves. Anzu was chatting about how scary the hospital was and everything, since she got burnt and everything. I personally thought that you could just go to a family doctor, get medicine prescribed and everything, but no, Anzu seemed to think that it would destroy her just because she got roasted by hot water.

Anyways, I wasn't really paying attention to her incessant rambling, so I was randomly staring around the room. Seto was sitting exactly twelve seats away from me… yes, I counted. Yes, I'm an obsessive freak. Yes, it might only be a crush now, but do you actually think I have a chance?

To tell the truth, no matter how awkward it was last class, I kind of enjoyed sitting beside him…

At that moment, our teacher finally walked in. "Good afternoon class! You must excuse my tardiness… I had some other appointments."

Watching him, I remembered that he had lost his Sennen Eye. I vaguely wondered what had happened to him, and whether he replaced his eye or something.

Quickly rethinking that, I shuddered. On the second hand, I don't think I would like to find out…

Clapping his hands to get the class's attention, the students silenced without delay.

"Ok… yesterday we learnt how to boil water. Now, I know you're all anxious to get into cooking meals and everything, but today, we're just going to review the basic things in the kitchen and everything. Fair enough?"

The class murmured, exchanging somewhat quiet comments.

Not waiting too long until everyone was done chattering, he continued. "I'm afraid it's going to take the first week of school… but don't worry! We will commence the actual cooking program shortly after the week has finished. All right?"

Everyone nodded, simultaneously, I noticed.

Pegasus thought for a moment, then spoke. "Oh, right, I just remembered. Due to the unfortunate accident yesterday, I have decided that you will remain working in partners. Everyone will stay partners for the rest of the year with who they worked with yesterday, ok?"

The outer me was shocked and miffed. The inner me was doing a victory dance, thinking, 'Oh YES! I get to work with Seto for the rest of the year!'

Anzu opened her mouth in protest, then looked furious, and then finally, turned around and glowered at Bakura, who was conveniently sitting behind her. Bakura, pretending not to notice her, put a hand into his pocket, pulled out a switchblade, flicked it open leisurely, and ever so slowly, ran his tongue along the blade of the thin slab of metal (how he didn't draw blood was well beyond me). The girl beside me gulped, and then turned to me, about to whine and rant about having to work with a 'tomb robber'.

Except I wasn't there.

I had already jumped and ran away, knowing that Anzu would want to complain to me. So, therefore, I sneaked away to the back row.

"Ok class, partner up!" said the man, again, sounding exuberant and joyful.

At that, I popped up from my position (crouching behind the chairs) and tapped Seto on the shoulder.

The multi-billionaire jumped at my touch, then turned around.

"What the hell? Oh, Yami."

So, we went to the same place we worked at yesterday. This time, chairs were set out behind each station. The students all sat down as Pegasus began our lesson.

"Ok, set out before each of you is a sheet of the rules that are expected to be followed. I'll have to count on you guys… if you ever break these rules, I'm afraid you might be removed from class."

Eyeing the list, I read:

Listen to the teacher at all times and follow all instructions. When necessary, safety equipment must be worn. No causing destruction or damage using the equipment. No usage of equipment if you intend on harming a fellow classmate. No eating ingredients of dish if said so. No food fights. Respect the teacher, your classmates, the equipment and cooking in general.

Going over the list of overly corny instructions (typical… especially the respect one), I raised my eyebrows. Ok… standard procedures.

"Now," Pegasus continued, "I will allow you to have time to discuss things with your partner… work things out. I'll be right back."

Where does that man go?

So, I sat there, looking at Seto. He looked right back. We sat staring for, oh, about a minute or so.

Then, finally, I couldn't stand it any more. I was itching to say this for a long time…

"Did you know that that style of the uniform makes you look like a total idiot and a geek?" (2) I asked, motioning towards his current attire. "Haven't you ever tried wearing the other style?" I continued, tugging on my uniform jacket.

He blinked. "I wasn't expecting that…" he muttered.

I nodded. "I know you weren't."

Looking up again, his gaze met mine. "I'll take that into consideration… why do you care anyways?"

Because I hate to see your appearance spoiled by that ugly piece of clothing. What, you think I'd say that? "Because I stare at you." That came out unintentionally.

"What?" He probably wasn't expecting that either. Well, duh…

"Because you're my partner and I'd hate to waste my time laughing when I look at you." I corrected myself, sounding solemn. Funny. This would actually be deemed 'humour'.

Glancing at me oddly, he turned to face the front.

Shrugging, I sat there. That went well.

Pegasus reentered the room, holding a moderately sized cardboard box. "Now, class, I'm fairly certain that most of you know all the utensils, but just in case some don't know, I'm going to go through them." Therefore, the man went into a long, detailed description of each and every spatula, kettle, fork, chopstick, whatever, until he went through the whole box.

I had learned most of them… Yugi helped me with it… although some still seemed foreign to me.

Wrapping up, Pegasus clapped his hands, a smile plastered on his face. "Now, we'll start by doing some very simple things! We're going to be boiling, scrambling, and whatever else you can do with eggs!"

I groaned. Not the eggs… I distinctly remember a rather unpleasant moment in the supermarket when Yugi forced me to go with him… eggs are 'delicate'… at least that's what Yugi said after he finished telling me off.

But, I suppose I'm just going to have to put up with this. Eggs were distributed to everyone, as were frying pans, aprons, cooking utensils, oil, and whatnot.

Pegasus dictated the commands, and everyone followed. Surprisingly, I didn't have too much of a problem…

Not for the first time, everyone turned at the sound of a scream. Bakura was standing there, smiling, while Anzu was on the ground. Under her foot was a cracked egg.

"BAKURA!"

~

(1) I don't know whether or not he ever lost Obelisk during Battle City, and quite frankly I don't give a damn either. He's keeping it.

(2) What, did you think he was going to confess about his secret 'little' crush? Not so easy…

~

To be continued…

-_-; Gah… I'm not feeling very creative at the moment. This chapter is only a filler.

Meh, well, I'll try to update soon.