The small clamor of conversing students was easy to ignore- my presence veiled by the dim lighting of the room, and the gray shutters blocking any light that the early morning had to offer.

Math was one of my best classes- in fact I always had the best grades, much better than all the other students- but the teachers agreed when I transferred that they wouldn't draw too much attention to me, for my condition would be an inconvenience for both parties. Despite my mixed feelings towards the isolation- and some days I want to scream that I existed- I rather enjoyed being alone; not that it made much of a difference of how I usually stay seated at my glass desk studying.

The school had three buildings, depending in the grade level the students went to classrooms inside their buildings. Though it was my second year of high school I still have not made any friends.

A lonely existence indeed.

As usual I walked silently down the halls in between classes alone, ignoring the groups that chortled at bad jokes- or ones that gossiped about the latest drama; but I was fine being alone, is what I often told myself. The engineering course I took was my absolute favorite; this week's project was to create a software of one's choosing that had to function properly- mine was a portable AI that could be uploaded to any device, but Rashid's AI had such a bleak personality I was reluctant to take him everywhere I went on my GCAIMS.

Don't get me wrong- I absolutely admire the genius who created the latest AI system CEO of Kou industry, the technology empire, Kouen Ren- or is he refereed to as Ren Kouen? Anyways since Balbadd was bought and conjoined with Kou nothing really seemed different, in fact his father still worked there with the Ren family.

By the time I was in the courtyard doing my English assignments the strangest thing happened- a heavy round object bounced off my head, causing me instant pain as my vision became darker.

"What happened to him?"

"The middle schoolers were playing ball again,"

"Poor guy."

"Are you alright?"

"What?" Came the raspy reply, and I realized the words had came from my own mouth, Looking up a pink haired girl gazed down at me, ball tucked underneath her arm.

"Whoa what happened to that guy's neck?" I heard the loud whisper; reflexively I fixed my scarf haphazardly, still dazed from the blow.

"Your head is bleeding." She stated nonchalantly.

Feeling the back of my head I felt a warm sticky substance on my fingers, panicked I attempt to stand so I could ran to the nurses office frantically- failing I collapsed as the world began to spin.

Wordlessly she slung me over her shoulder like a rag doll as I dumbly let her run through the halls as she carrried me to the main office. "Ah! Morgiana, what happened?" I heard Ugo, the school director inquire, concern thick in his voice. "Phoenix; Falcor where's Pheonix?"

"Duno' but could you tell her I said that she looked wonderful last night."

"No!"

"He passed out." Were the last words I heard.

When I woke up staring at the ceiling of the nurse's office, a soft tune bring hummed stored me furthers as I sat up oh the stiff cot. The pink haired girl sat with her back towards me humming softly a sweet lullaby. "It's beautiful." I commented abruptly; she puffed out her cheeks that had an adorable blush. Shocked by the sudden reaction I asked, "what is it called?"

"Poufu." She answered. I listened as she began to sing the melody. "There's a little ball of fluff, softest to the touch that likes a lot of stuff. He doesn't talk much but he's still my best friend." Abruptly she stopped. "I apologize I got carried away."

"It's fine."

"I heard you were mute." She said after a long moment of silence.

"Not completely."

"Yet you talk to me?"

"I'm making an exception."

"Hi Alibaba!" Aladdin waved happily from the doorway, the eight year old happily flaunted his missing tooth in a big smile. "Hi Morgiana!"

I had met Aladdin the first year I had transfered here, and I was his math tutor because his teacher at the time had been giving him bad grades for... grabbing her breast in the middle of class and rubbing his fave in between them...honestly the kid needed all the help that he could get. Also Ugo had hoped that some of Aladdin's 'best qualities' would rub off on me, however this has yet to happen.

Thank the gods that didn't happen; the entire military will have orders to murder a perverted blonde with emotional issues if that ever happens. What were you thinkingthinking Ugo?!

"I see you're as good as ever making good excuses." Aladdin teased nudging my side.

"Eh? They're not excuses- they're just-"

"Loophole's?" Morgiana offered.

"Ways to get out of a situation?" Aladdin chimed.

"Euphenmism?"

I groaned rubbing my hair furiously in frustration. "Those are just more words for excuses!"

The smile creeping up onto my lips as I opened my eyes wasn't very reassuring- in fact it made me question my sanity a little, recalling the first time our trio talked.

"Good morning sir? Have you rested well?" Dave with his slightly less than annoying mechanical voice asked.

"Yes Dave, I'm in such a good mood I can't come up with any snippy comebacks."

"I'm overjoyed sir; it makes morning procedures much more efficient on both parts."

"Were you complaining Dave?" Baffled I looked everywhere, wonder where the hell was I supposed to look at a voice in my room- wow this must sound crazy to any onlooker.

"I do believe that is what you programmed me to do occasionally, are you pleased?" The AI inquired as a selection of my saved outfits appeared on a rotating image projector. "The weather today is approximately seventy eight degrees with mild breezes from the north east- and the range does not change throughout the day until eight pm at seventy five degrees- I recommend "I look like I don't care in a sexy way", sir."

"Okay Dave- and you're doing splendid today." I had to give the machine credit, after I had programmed him he probably would've gotten sick of me in a few days if I hadn't messed up and accidentally made him so nice.

"I appreciate the praise, sir."

Sarah's sister, Amanda who was in a serious need of a very loud Christmas Carol (right in her waxy ears to make sure that the three ghost get the right one), waited for me impatiently by the reception desk- oh right, the Scrooge worked here, with my brother's boss.

Shit.

"Good morning Amanda." That sounded way too cheerful- but the look on her face was worth the case of bile mixing with my toothpaste.

"Morning brat." She sighed.

Whoa. That was surprisingly nice of her. "Though night?"

She shrugged, dark marks underneath her eyes. "I was sorting through a bunch of old documents for Koumei all night. How did your first day go?"

Now I actually felt a little bad for being mean to her all this time. "Just answering phone calls and shifting through paperwork." And then taking my boss out to dinner slow dancing with him in a diner to a song after we shared a plate of cheese fries, and maybe wanting to kiss him a little for unknown reasons just a teansy little bit. Nope, it was a totally uneventful evening.

"Ha! Even a brat like you couldn't mess that up." She ruffled my hair with her hand making it seem even more disheveled than it already was. "Later kid, I'm getting my quota of sleep before the bigger brat drags me back."

Taking the elevator to the floor Kouen's office was- did I mention we ended up on a first name basis too? Of course we agreed it would be on a professional level, and that's honestly the only way I could look at my boss...but then... the chime of the elevator reaching it's destination disturbed me from my thoughts.

Hakruyuu and Kouen stood in the spacious glass hallway talking softly when they both glanced back at me- who was no wishing I wore something a little more professional than Kouen's chic dress shirt that was made out some -who-knows-what godly material that could make a group of women swoon.

I felt my confidence plummet when I accidentally reminded myself how non-existent my skills at casual flirting were.

"Good morning." I greeted, all the life drained away from my voice.

"Alibaba are you okay?" Hakruyuu asked. Now that I noticed that Hakruyuu's wardrobe was rather plain it didn't help the fact that my stomach was now angrily doing somersaults at the three energy drinks I had haphazardly consumed too quickly this morning, and I almost wanted to vomit recalling putting an extra six in my bag.

"I'm fine, I'm just not used to getting up so early on Sundays." That was partially the truth Sunday was the only I didn't study and dedicated it to hours of reruns and ice cream, but since I graduated I've been trying to find a healthier activity since Aladdin always 'kindly' pointed out I weighed more after Sunday's.

"What do you usually do on Sunday's?" He asked.

Don't you dare answer that question honestly! Lie! Lie like a dog! Please make me sound cool! I had yelled at myself internally. "Sightseeing." I admitted sheepishly, "I don't do it every Sunday, but it's nice to see what you find." Success!

"What's so fun about that?" The puzzled teenager inquired.

Crap, think of something cool. "I guess it's not really for everybody," god that was so lame.

"That's rather unexpected of you Alibaba! I would expect you to stay inside all day and eat chocolate while listening to sad songs." Hakruyuu mused.

I almost sobbed as I remembered how I used to spend my Tuesdays. "Yeah..." I couldn't even finish a sentence as I became a walking corspe for the day.

Kouen watched silently with an amused smirk. "Alibaba."

"hat?(What? )"

"I want you to go down to storage and organize some documents for Koumei- his assistant is out." He handed me a data disc. "Most of them are paper so I want you to look through all of them."

"Okay." After being directed by a few coworkers where storage was I walked into the dark room that had so much dust it instantly became hard to breath, I soon realized why Amanda was so tried, and I also figured I was going to die of heart problems if I really was going to look through all of these documents. Opening the data stored on the disc a small portion of the never ending list was completed- and I soon realized how difficult my task would be when I saw the two hundred new entries.

Please bury me with chocolate, was my only requisition on my will as I took out my reading glasses to dive in.

Seven hundred papers later I was playing music loud enough to be heard from the hallway- noticing most of the material were smaller files of the mecharmor project; whilst I indulged my curiosity without fear of getting in trouble. I silently wished Aladdin was here to help, but his eidetic memory isn't as good as it used to be.

"You should take a break."

Startled, I jumped in my seat knocking over one of the piles I had sorted as irrelevant. I looked up at the red head in suprise- noticing he looked rather disgruntled. "Ren Kouemi, uh sorry sir I haven't finished much." I quickly put the mess back in order ignoring the eyes boring into my back.

"Did you hear what I said; 'you should take a break'." He repeated, forcing the words out forcefully as if he was struggling to keep the words sounding monotone behind his frustration. "You're practically wheezing."

Now that he had mentioned it, my breathing was rather ragged because of the all the dust that was in the room, now being disturbed by my constant shuffling. "That's alright." I waved my hands reassuringly. " I have a MDI." Talking the puffer out of my bag I almost sighed at how much the clump in my throat disappeared.

He sighed, shielding a portion of his face with a black feathered fan.

" You look sharper than usual today." I commented after noticing the black rose tucked into the pocket of his brown blazer.

"Do I?" There was a pause. "Are you implying that my usual style of dress is not as appealing."

"Well it might just be your hair, it looks like somebody tried to comb it." Came my blunt reply. The nerve racking moment of silence was filled with fretting over my horrible phrasing, hoping he wouldn't be upset at the next thing I discovered was that Koumei had a nice laugh- and I had almost thought that a third party was chuckling at my own stupidity.

"Astonishing..." He breathed recovering his breath as I stared at him dumbly. "You are the first to actually guess correctly; every Sunday I allow Kouha to attempt to tame my hair to keep peace among the house- no one could ever tell what was different." He explained. "Is something wrong?" He asked awkwardly seeing my expression.

"You have the most adorable laugh in the world." I probably looked like a three year old who walked into a candy store on his birthday, but I really didn't care.

He coughed, raising his fan higher to cover his face. "That's a peculiar thing to say."

I wasn't sure if it was the red of his hair making his ears look like they had a thin veil of pink or my eyes screaming for mercy in this horrible lighting. "But it's so pulchrituinous."

"You shouldn't slack off." He scolded averting his eyes elsewhere. "Let me know when you're crawling into your deathbed." He waved walking towards the exit. That was odd.

Once again I lost track of time when I heard my name. "Alibaba." Kouen's familiar voice called out.

"I'm over here!"

As he approached he glanced curiously at the two empty cans on the table, and the additional four spilling out of my satchel. "I was a bit concerned when Koumei walked into my office telling me that you were trying to kill yourself with paper cuts, but I see now that there was nothing to worry about."

I let out a laugh. "I actually did get a paper cut, see." Childishly I held out my thumb with a pout. "And it really hurts too."

A sly predatory smile spread on Kouen's lips as he gently took my hand kissing the small gash.

"What are you doing?" I barely managed to stutter out.

"To be honest, I'm trying an indirect approach." His voice was notably deeper as he stared down at me with clouded eyes, still holding my hand as he occasionally gave soft kisses to my skin.

"Stop." I choke out in a whisper when he suddenly pulled me in close lifting me up on the table kissing my neck.

Abruptly he stopped setting me back down on my feet as he took a step back. "What happened to your neck?" He sternly looked down at me- as if he was daring me not to answer him.

"I don't want to talk about it." It was easier this way.

"Alibaba." He almost growled out. "What happened to your neck?"

"How about we don't ignore what just happened a few minuets ago?" Stop talking.

"Okay."

"Don't just randomly start kissing people like that, and don't you have work you should be doing? It bugs me that you expect people to beg to sleep with you because it kind of makes me sick just thinking about it." I wouldn't be surprised if he was angry, or even yelled at me.

Yet again I was baffled when he bowed before me with his head lowered. "I apologize.

"Uh...you really don't need to..." I started awkwardly, feeling ashamed that he was apologizing after what I had said.

"Alibaba." He stood up straight staring down at me with the most terrifying expression. "It was selfish of me to not consider your feelings- but I will still pursue your affections until you're begging for me to go farther." The last few works were nothing more than a husky whisper that caused me to shiver.

"Don't joke around."I wanted to ignore the fact that Kouen didn't like to be subtle for long and would probably do something crazy out of the blue- but the last thing I was going to do was indulge myself in his game.

"It's three in the morning."

"What?" How long have I been here?

"It's three in the morning. Let me drive you home." The suggestion was more of a command, but I found that my sense of direction is completely unreliable at night, and maybe Kouen would get bored with me if I did spend some time with him. Wordlessly I followed him to his car which was a not yet released model, and I curled up in the passenger seat with a meek mewl of frustration."Did you meow?"

"No, its my manly howl of frustration."I grumbled sarcastically, ignoring the warmth next to me. "It's natural, even my mom does it, I don't know why though." Later I was going to marvel at the fact I could still have a normal conversation with this man. "About last night..." and our awkward almost kiss "...Sorry if I mislead you I-"

"Alibaba."

"Huh?"

"You only have to say what you want." The warmth beside me shifted as I shut my eyes tightly attempting to ignore the idea that he was leaning over me. "So I won't do anything until you ask."

"Were you even intending to listen!?"

"No."

"At least pretend..." I started, but quickly stopped the idea of having an actual relationship with the playboy- who was never known to be in one for very long- I opened my eyes glancing out the window to gaze at the streaks of light as the car sped through the sky. "Do you get tired of it sometimes?"My question was met by silence.

Tracing the silver scar on my neck, I continued to gaze out the window with an unhealthy fixation. "What happened to you neck."

I laughed bitterly. "Nothing special really."

Kouen parked in front of the apartment, without a word he stepped out of the car glancing at me expectantly. Groaning at his stubborn need for getting what he wanted, I lead the way ignoring the bright lights that gleamed in the glorious room discarding my belongings.

" Sir, your father has left a message for you- saying he will be gone for a few days with your brothers- also he says you're welcome to do as you please; would you like me to invite your companions over tomorrow on your day off?" Dave asked. "Or would you prefer I prepare a beverage for you and your guest?"

"Coffee." I said, to which Kouen raised an eyebrow.

"I do not advise that sir. You have passed the standard of a healthy intake of caffeine by thirty seven grams." He retorted.

I spun on my heel facing Kouen, whose expression I could no longer read and said. "You don't have to stay."

"I wanted to keep you company."

" You should go."

"No."

"Don't you have someone expecting you?"

Once again the most paltry shiver went down my spine at the feral beast grinning before me stepping closer with his voice smooth and silky, low murmurs that made the hair stand up on the back of my neck warning me of danger. "Only you. In a bed. Begging me to-"

"Dave where's my coffee!" I flushed furiously stepping back at glancing towards the kitchen; when my question was met with silence I choked out, baffled: "he ditched me!" And when I needed him most. You'll pay Dave, you'll pay.

"Did you want to kiss me last night?" He asked sitting down on the large couch, impassively observing my expression.

I ran my hand through my hair nervously. Did I? "Honestly I thought it was a spur of the moment thing."

"Would you like to kiss me?" Despite looking slightly dejected- or it was my mind playing tricks on me from lack of sleep- his inquiry caused my cheeks to burn to an almost unbearable intensity.

" I don't know." Was all I could admit. I knew it shouldn't be so confusing- yet it was it exasperating how I couldn't determine if I wanted to go beyond admiration.

"I see." Was all he said. "Do you hear snoring?"

Raising an eyebrow, I indeed did hear the soft noise, following it into the kitchen- glaring down at the open ice cream cartons and chocolate wrappers around a sleeping Aladdin. "Hey." I tapped his shoulder with my foot. "Aladdin, wake up so I can hit you for eating all my food."

He groaned rolling over. "That's not nice, Alibaba."

"What are you doing here?" I rasped ignoring the third pair of eyes on me.

"I was waiting for you and I fell asleep."

" Before or after you ate all my food?"

"When Morgiana found a hidden stash of playboy magazines in your room-"

"Those aren't mine!" I blurted out blushing furiously.

"They just happened to be in your room?" Kouen interjected with a teasing smirk.

I can always rely on life to be an asshole when it really counts.

After Aladdin left, and promising to spend time with him tomorrow; Kouen, despite my frustrations, tinkered around on my GCAIMS on my bed while I was writing down some of the information I absorbed earlier today. Spinning in my favorite chair I watched Kouen move through the holographic screens faster than I could manage myself.

" What are you doing?" I finally asked shuffling beside him.

He pulled me closer- causing me to fall ungracefully when I attempted to struggle, but he took advantage of my momentary blunder and pulled me so close our sides were touching as I laid on my stomach. "Trying to see where's the most comfortable spot for you to scream my name." He joked with a tone so flat I almost thought he was being serious.

I laughed, poking his arm playfully. "I would recommend there." Pointing towards my pillows. "But seriously what are you doing?"

"First, I gave you my phone numbers, and email; then I hacked my computer with your 'applications'- to which I won't ask- and now I'm adjusting your calendar for a trip to Sindria next week."

"Sindria? I have to do something for a friend in Sindria during that week."

"I know, but you'll be able to go. We spend some extra time there for the others."

"Okay. But why are you cracking your mainframe?" I watched as he entered various codes.

"I'm putting my schedule in your phone's memory." He explained. "Thursday I have a meeting and I want you to be there."

I ignored the flux of my heartbeat at his words. "Lunch with parents... that was today." I observed. "Did you go?"

Kouen ignored my question, instead shifting through the dates; deciding not to cross any boundaries I focused on his plans too- noticing he had quite a few board meetings. "Kassim is your brother."

" Yes?" I answered the statement slowly.

"And he wrestles."

" Yes."

"And his match is on Tuesday."

Where was this going? " Yes."

"OK."

My brow tensed. "What does that mean?"

"It means I get you to myself for three days." He smirked victoriously.

Shit.

An entire week with the Ren's in a tropical paradise was already starting to look less alluring.