Hikari was not in a very good mood. Mostly because of the fact she kept experiencing odd blackouts.

However she drew the line after the incident with the escaped convict. Knowing that someone who looked like her wearing the Puzzle had tricked the criminal into setting himself on fire was the last straw.

To that end, she was going to try and find out what the blazes was going on. She never had this issue before solving the Millennium Puzzle, and she had a weird feeling the strange blackouts were connected to it.

Fortunately her teacher had a private meditation room, and she had long since been permitted to use it to gather her thoughts in peace.

Hikari sat down and calmly reached inward to her 'Room' as she liked to call it. It was a representation of herself as a person, and she had tidied it up when she first figured out the trick to it.

It certainly made studying a lot easier.

Hikari frowned when she saw the door. The last time she had been in her Room, there wasn't any actual opening into it. If there was a door here now, that meant she would have to take steps against anyone who might have the ability to enter here.

Her hand reached out and touched the doorknob, and the moment she opened it she found herself in a dark corridor. Her unease rose, as she exited the safety of her room.

There was another door, though this one cast a dark shadow over the corridor itself and had the same imprint that the Puzzle had.

She cautiously opened the door. She was going to get to the bottom of this and if necessary give whoever it was that caused her blackouts a piece of her mind. She did not appreciate the fact that they used her body to trick that convict into killing himself!

It felt as cold and welcoming as a pharaoh's tomb. Not surprising considering the Puzzle was supposedly Egyptian.

It was strange though. She seemed to be radiating light from her body, making it easier to see in the pitch black.

That was when she felt it. Something stirred and took notice of her in the room, and it wasn't amused.

She wasn't about to let that stop her though. A strange sense of calm settled over her mind, as she navigated the maze with a feeling of purpose. Unnoticed the light began to strengthen and she started to see actual hieroglyphs on the walls. She ignored several rooms...she wasn't an idiot and she knew perfectly well that Egyptian tombs were filled with traps and false rooms meant to deter thieves. Especially those belonging to royalty.

Finally she was in front of a room that felt "right" to her.

She carefully opened the door, and saw someone inside.

The figure was decidedly male, and had the most ridiculous hairstyle outside of an anime series. Unfortunately she was aware her own hair had a weird habit of doing the same thing when it was cut too short...hence why she had grown it out. It was much easier to deal with and she had less snide comments from other girls. He wore a copy of her school uniform, though it was flared out in a rather dramatic fashion.

There was something decidedly dark about this boy, and yet for some reason she was perfectly at ease despite the fact she was in his territory.

"I don't know how you found this room so fast, but you'll regret intruding into my mind like this," he warned her arrogantly.

Hikari couldn't help the twitch on her face.

"Excuse me?" she said less than amused.

"Not even I am safe in here...you'll not find it as easy getting out as you did getting in," he said calmly, since she had not made any act of aggression towards him.

"Like I would be stupid enough to open random doors when traversing an artifact supposedly owned by Egyptian royalty," she snarked. "I know full well they had a rather firm no tolerance policy to people trying to get into a tomb after the body was placed and the spells cast."

That seemed to throw him for a loop.

"I...what?" he said surprised at her attitude.

"The Puzzle is supposedly an artifact of great power," she said matter of factly. "Add in the appearance of your Room and it's obvious that it's going to be trapped to the nine hells and back with any number of unpleasant surprises for intruders attempting to access it's full potential."

"If you knew that, then why did you come?" he asked baffled.

She glared at him.

"To register a strong complaint to the idiot who apparently keeps possessing me whenever I black out," she replied irate. "I really didn't appreciate you using my body to kill that man, regardless of whether it was justified or not."

The shock on his face was hilarious. Mostly from the realization of who the young woman actually was.

"Aibou?" he said in disbelief.

She folded her arms in irritation.

"Look, I have no issue with you possessing my body from time to time...though the fact the spirit doing so is a guy is a tad weird. But I do have a problem with you dispersing punishment in front of so many witnesses. In case you've forgotten, whenever you return control I'm the one who has to deal with the inevitable fallout. Next time you want to punish someone, try to be a bit less public about it."

He looked chagrined at that.

"I apologize. My only thought was removing the threat to Anzu before she was permanently harmed, outside of being traumatized."

"Which is the only reason I'm merely registering a complaint, as opposed to taking the Puzzle off and locking it up. So far the only time you've come out is when I actually need a little back-up," she replied. "Since you're clearly protective of my friends, I have no problem extending a bit of trust as to your intentions."

"How did you make it this far?" he asked, confused.

"I don't know," she answered honestly. "I just followed where my feet took me. Which reminds me, do you have an actual name?"

He shook his head.

"If I had a name, I don't remember what it was. I'm mostly acting on instinct at the moment," he admitted.

Something told her that the name had been deliberately lost, though she couldn't explain how she knew.

"Considering the Puzzle was in a number of pieces and left alone for thousands of years, that's not surprising."

The expression on his face hurt.

"Yami."

"Excuse me?" he said confused.

"If my soul is acting as your moral compass, that makes you my 'inner darkness'. So Yami, at least until we find out what your original name was," she said finally. "No one should go without a name, even if it's a temporary one."

The spirit looked at her with a strange expression on his face. It took her a moment to realize the tomb-like atmosphere had lightened...just a bit. It was merely dim, as opposed to oppressive darkness. Still nearly impossible to see, but there was a distinct absence of an abyss surrounding you.

"Yami... I don't mind being called that," he said quietly.

He lead Hikari back out of his room, though there was a strangely fond expression on his face.

"I am so sorry about earlier," said Jounouchi, looking rather miserable.

"For the last time, it's fine. It's not like I haven't had worse from tournaments," said Hikari.

Jounouchi had, during one of their sparring sessions at the gym, accidentally given Hikari a black eye on her left side. He had been so upset that Hikari had called the match a draw. Jounouchi was still getting used to the fact that Hikari was a fighter and therefor a lot more durable than he originally estimated.

Besides, this one thing Anzu and Miho didn't mind helping with.

Hikari managed to hide the injury when they entered school, but Anzu and Miho took one look and knew.

The girls took Hikari aside for ten minutes, since they still had time before first class started, and by the time they came back the bruise was more or less hidden. Didn't make Jounouchi feel any less guilty though.

"Who's our first class with anyway?" asked Hikari.

"Chouno-sensei," said Anzu.

"Oh hell... I heard she had another marriage interview yesterday," groaned Hikari.

"What's that got to do with anything?" asked Jounouchi.

"The last three times she's gone on one of those, she pulled a surprise inspection on the class and gotten someone expelled," said Hikari. "Believe me, I checked since she's had it out for me from the beginning for some stupid reason."

Everyone else who heard her paled.

There was a mad scramble as everyone spent the next five minutes trying to ditch anything that would get the Witch of Expel to target them. The teacher was known to use the most minor of infractions to get students kicked out just to satisfy her own ego. The girls all hated her, especially since she wore far too much make-up.

Miho looked confused at the puzzle in her desk, but since she had forewarning she was able to hide it before the teacher came in.

Chouno-sensei was peeved that she couldn't find anything, since the class had been forewarned against her inspection this time. The students were all very tense the entire class and were relieved when the bell rang.

"I have a question for you Muto-san. How did you know she went on one of those interviews anyway?" asked Risa. She was one of the more popular girls in class.

"I get an alert from an older friend whenever Chouno-sensei's name pops up in the circles for Omoumi," said Hikari flatly. "Mostly because I made the connection of her expelling record coinciding with another interview. If you think her record here is bad, you should hear what the people who arrange those things have to say about her. Apparently she had a nasty reputation for humiliating the men who come to them."

Seeing the expressions on the other girl's faces, it was obvious that particular tidbit would be filtering through the school soon. She just hoped it didn't come back to her as the source of the newest juicy rumor among students.

(Her luck was not that good.)

Hikari had a bad feeling, so she made sure her grandfather was available when she was called into the principal's office regarding the 'defamation of character towards a teacher', according to the adults.

"Muto-san, would you care to explain why you decided to spread such a vicious rumor regarding Chouno-sensei?" asked the principal.

"It's not a rumor though, and I learned about it from legitimate sources," she said calmly.

"You nasty little brat. It's not enough you cross-dress in school, but you're petty enough to slander my reputation?" said Chouno-sensei. She looked pissed.

"First off, you personally confirmed with the principal that there are no female uniforms my size the beginning of the year and that it was financially unfeasible to for me to purchase one for my family," said Hikari calmly, not backing down. "Secondly the only reason I found out about your record is because I made an off-hand comment to my ballet instructor about your so called inspections and she recognized your name and general description from the marriage interview circles."

The principal frowned at that.

"Care to explain that?"

"My mother and I have an agreement that she'll overlook my poor physical education grades so long as I participate in an extracurricular activity outside of school appropriate for a girl. My ballet teacher recognized her name from one of my previous complaints when two of the people who arrange the interviews for clients happened to be talking about it loud enough for her to overhear them while she was leaving," explained Hikari. "It wasn't hard for me to connect the dots between a so-called surprise inspection from the teacher to another failed interview. After the second time it happened, I asked if she would warn me whenever sensei's name came up so I knew to keep only my school things in my bag that day."

The principal didn't look happy, and the female teacher looked even more angry than before if that was possible.

"I see. Thank you Muto-san for your time. You may leave now."

Hikari barely closed the door when she heard Chouno-sensei explode in fury that she wasn't being expelled immediately.

It wasn't exactly her fault that the woman's bad habits had come back to roost. The only thing she had done was ask her ballet teacher to warn her if the woman's name came up...she didn't know any personal details so Chouno-sensei could hardly expel her for it.

The worst thing she had done was comment on it to the some of the bigger gossips, which was hardly expulsion worthy since she never actually said anything about the woman herself.

Hikari had to feel a bit of vindictive satisfaction and no small amount of relief hearing the vile woman had been forced to take a leave of absence pending an investigation over her expulsion records.

It was one thing to expel a student over bad grades or reputation...it was another matter entirely for them to be kicked out because the teacher was in a bad mood over a failed interview and was using them as stress release.

Hikari knew of Seto Kaiba, but for obvious reasons they didn't run in the same circles. Therefor she was a bit suspicious about why the CEO of a large company visited her grandfather's tiny shop and demanded he hand over the card that his friend had given him many years ago.

The weird thing was that she kept seeing Kaiba in an outfit that wouldn't be uncommon for Egyptian nobility and tanned skin, as opposed to the pale skinned jackass trying to strong arm her grandfather into handing his friend's card over.

She wasn't about to let him get away with it though. She knew a few things about Kaiba he'd almost certainly would prefer people would forget.

Hikari made sure to lower her voice so only Kaiba would hear what she had to say after her grandfather rejection of his 'generous' offer.

"I'm sure your dead step-father Gozaburo would be very proud that you've decided to strong arm people who pose no actual threat to your reputation into handing over what you want," she said flatly, before he left.

Kaiba stiffened, and she wasn't surprised when he confronted her over it the next day.

"What do you know about that man?" he demanded pissed.

"It's called public domain," she snarked. "I looked up grandpa's card out of boredom and found rumors someone was trying to acquire the cards by force if the original owner was unwilling to part with it. There was a brief mention of the name 'Kaiba' on the forum before it was abruptly deleted from the site. I thought it was weird so I looked up the name and found several pages on you...and a somewhat hidden news article about the mysterious death of the former CEO of Kaiba Corp and known arms dealer."

Seto Kaiba was openly surprised she had caught on to him so quickly.

"Who else knows about this?"

"Anyone can find out if they bother to look. Leave my grandfather and our shop alone and no one at school has to know," said Hikari.

"Are you blackmailing me?" said Kaiba.

"No, I'm merely making a deal. Something that as a businessman you'd understand rather well. You leave my family and the shop alone, and I won't have a reason to remind people that your step-father died under mysterious circumstances," said Hikari flatly. "The media loves to go after potentially juicy scandals, and I sincerely doubt you want to deal with the headache of them in your personal life."

Kaiba instinctively knew Muto had backed him into a corner and he was not happy about it.

"This isn't over Muto."

"Just to be clear, I only said to leave my grandfather's card alone. He doesn't care a bit about it's potential value or plan to use it in his deck. To him it's a reminder of the bond he has with the friend who gave it to him, nothing else. And I'm not inclined to use it in my deck since it's his card. Besides, you can only have three copies in an official tournament deck anyway," she reminded him.

Kaiba glared at her, but a sliver of respect over the fact she didn't back down grew in his soul.

He wasn't going to back down when it came to the Blue Eyes White Dragon though. He'd just leave her grandfather's copy for last.