Official Summary: Kuronue is the run of the mill bad boy. His only true friend is the smartest kid in the school—Kurama Minamino. When the history teacher refuses to let them work together on a project, Kuronue gets paired up with a young woman who lives to follow the rules. Will Kuronue be able to teach her that rules are meant to be broken or will she be able that the rules are there for a reason before he breaks one too many rules? Or she'll just learn how blind bats truly are.

Note from Author: Welcome everyone to my third official Story/Pairing. If you haven't already, there is the Butterfly Saga featuring a pairing between Kurama and an OC and also the Courage to Feel about an empath who Kurama helps to realize that being human isn't a bad thing. I welcome all of you to go read those if you haven't.

Also, this story is going to take part in a universe where there are no demons (AKA an alternate universe). There is no Lord Koenma, Yusuke, Team Urameshi, etc. The only characters that I will have in here that were from the anime will be Kuronue and Kurama.

Now, without further ado: Bats are Blind

Chapter 1

"You will do as you are instructed Mister Kuronue." The teacher said calmly, her blue-grey eyes holding his own black ones. She had started only a few weeks ago and yet she held most of the student's attention. She was rough and ready to deal with any troublemaker, such as the tall junior that had entered her class late for the last time. She'd heard about him from the other teachers and while she didn't like to judge a book by its cover as the old saying went, it seemed he was living up to the cover pretty well.

"I want to work with Kurama. We always work together." Kuronue said from the back of the class room where he lounged. His black hair was pulled back into a pony tail that fell to the beginning of his shoulder blades. His black eyes were locked with the teacher. He couldn't believe that because he was late once, she was going to keep him from working with his best friend on a project that was half their grade—especially a project that would take half the semester to finish. Ugh he just wanted to walk out but knew that he'd never get to work with his best friend if he did that.

"Kuronue, you aren't the only one that is unhappy about this situation." The teacher said, seeing the girl she had picked to be his new partner shift uneasily in her own seat.

The teacher liked her. Naomi Daiki was a dedicated worker that had wanted to work alone when they had picked partners. That had been five minutes before Kuronue had felt he could grace them with his presence. Now the girl would have to work with him because there was no one left in the room that didn't have a partner already.

"Then why not shift us around? Let me work with Kurama and give that chick the partner he frees up." Kuronue argued, keeping the teacher from continuing on. How hard could it be? They had only been working together for 4 minutes. They couldn't have gotten that far in their preparations.

"You gave up the chance to work with your friend when you decided to be late Mister Kuronue. I will not have any more discussion on it. You will work with Miss Daiki or will receive a zero for the semester's main project." The teacher told him, watching him for another challenge.

"That's not fair! I had a real reason for being late. You can't penalize me for being late." Kurama argued, sitting up straight in his desk, glaring up at the woman. He knew that when they got this new teacher it would be stupid. She treated him like a child and he didn't like that one bit.

"Oh, and what was the reason Mister Kuronue?" the teacher questioned, looking at the troublemaker.

Kuronue looked up. What had kept him from getting to class on time?

"Hey there. Are you new in this school or have you just been hiding from me?" he had asked a girl that he had seen in the lobby of the school talking to a few friends. She'd been pretty at least. Golden hair floated around her shoulders as blue-grey eyes turned to survey the young man. She most definitely wasn't Japanese, but was a beauty anyway.

"Yes I am new, and you are?" She asked as politely as she could, her 'friends' trying to pull her away. They at least knew his reputation at least.

He couldn't help but grin at the memory of hitting on the girl (quite successfully, he might add since he had her new phone number in his pants pocket). "I had to show someone, who was new, where here classroom was." He announced triumphantly. To him it seemed like a reasonable reason to be late for class.

The teacher just stared at him. She remembered her own years as a high school student for they weren't that long ago, but she had never heard this excuse for being late. She had to admit that it was creative. But there was no way to verify it and so she only scowled. "I'm sure Mister Kuronue. Whether you were late for an important reason or not, you are going to be working with Miss Daiki on this semester's project. If you don't like it, get it done quickly and you won't have to deal with her for much longer." The teacher suggested with an icy smile before turning back to helping the group she had been ignoring since Kuronue had started this argument.

She didn't see him send a glare her way as he pushed himself down in his seat. He wouldn't work with someone he didn't know. For all he knew this Daiki-chick would boss him around like no one's business. His view of the teacher was interrupted as a young woman sat in the desk in front of him. He noted obvious discomfort in her face, but she didn't hesitate to pull out a notebook and putting it on his desk before searching for a pen. He took the time she was getting ready to study the girl.

She sat in the school uniform, filling it well for her five foot eight height. She maybe weighted 145, 150 at best. She wasn't fat by far, but she wasn't one of the super skinny girls either. Her red hair was pulled back in a pony tail as her hazel eyes searched her bag for a pen. She was definitely one of the girls that Kuronue wouldn't get caught dead with. She was a bookworm from what he did know, and he had enough of that from Kurama.

Finally she found a pen and turned her brown mixed with green eyes locking on him, assessing him for the first time. Naomi wasn't impressed. She had spent her last semester working on not catching anyone's attention. While being half American meant little now that it was 2007, she was the only one besides her father who had the red hair in the family. She'd been the victim of bullying by boys just like Kuronue who had found her an oddity that stuck out.

"I guess we are stuck together." She finally announced, her voice crisp and straight to the point. She didn't want to spend any more time with him than she had too. The rest of the classroom was working together, the noise rising as they competed to be heard over the group next to them. Naomi would have preferred to work by herself and get this done in a weekend rather than be forced to use the class time for it.

"Listen, whatever your name is, I'm not working with you." Kuronue said bluntly, looking away across the room as if she was nothing more than a fly that had passed by him.

Naomi scowled at him and then started to pack her things away. She had been willing to give this a go. She really had. But if he was going to act like this, she wasn't going to fight about it. "Fine. Then I hope you like a failing grade." She told him, slinging her bag over her shoulder and preparing to leave. She wasn't snobbish. Not really. She just didn't like people like Kuronue and preferred to work alone. It went faster that way.

She stuffed the pen she had been about to use into her bag as Kuronue groaned and grabbed her wrist. If it was working with this girl or getting a failed grade, he supposed he'd be force to work with her. He'd talk about it with Kurama that evening when they met up to hang out.

She froze and looked down at him, her hazel eyes dangerous. "If you don't let go, I'll be force to do something pretty nasty to your hand, and then you'll never be able to use it again." She threatened, though she wasn't really sure how she'd do that with him being almost six three in height.

Spunky this one he thought with a laugh to himself. He supposed she wouldn't be that bad to work with after all, especially if she kept trying to threaten him uselessly. "I'll work with you. I need to pass this class in order to graduate next year." He admitted and released her hand. He then relaxed back in his seat and tilted his head to one side. "So what are we going to be doing again?"

Naomi stared at him. He had thrown nine kinds of hell and didn't even know what the project was about? She slumped down into the seat she had just been in while staring at him. She was never going to get through this fast enough she finally decided. Sighing she pulled out her notebook again and took a sheet that explained everything for the project and handed it to the late student.

Kuronue skimmed it and started to scowl.

Points: 100

Subject: Groups must choose one act in Japanese history prior to the World Wars that has made a great impact on the way things are run today.

Students will need to present this in both a speech to the class and a poster for the end of semester History Fair.

He looked up at her as the listed objectives for the project went on. "Are you serious? This is a whole semester project." He demanded, sounding far angrier than he had earlier that he didn't get to work with Kurama. He hated school. He couldn't wait to get out. This was going to drag on the whole semester which meant Kurama would be too busy to hang out soon if he was the excellent student he pretended to be in front of everyone else.

"Exactly why everyone got here early in order to get the partner they wanted. Even your friend Kurama got here earlier than normal." She explained, taking the piece of paper back and flipping to a new page in her notebook that wasn't doodled on. She uncapped the pen and began to doodle in the margin of her notebook without noticing.

"How would they know to get here early? I didn't even know there was a project for this class." Kuronue demanded and the girl pulled out another piece of paper and gave it to him. His eyes scanned this one quickly as well:

History Syllabus

…
Dates to Remember:

…
September 24th: Students must be present for group projects for this trimester will be picked and assigned. Students may choose their partners if they arrive on time. Late or absent students will have no choice in which they are partnered with.

It went on to list other projects and things that were important, but Kuronue only groaned in anger. He had lost the syllabus long before now and wanted nothing to do with this girl. In fact he wanted to go over and throw the syllabus in the teachers face and tell her she should have warned them.

"She also said last Friday to arrive early if we wished to pick our partners ourselves." Naomi said as she continued to absently doodle in the margin after writing topic on the first line of the paper. "So what do you want to do? Or are you still on the 'I'd rather be out screwing some pretty girl' fence?" She was no innocent maiden as many believed her to be. In fact she figured she was the least innocent of her family who prided itself on its innocence. This made Kuronue's mouth drop however as he looked at the girl who seemed absent from the room as if she were a thousand miles away with someone else entirely.

"Excuse me?" He choked out at last before laughter took over. Definitely spunky. He told himself as he tried to get his laughter under control. He could see Kurama looking at him oddly and he finally got it under his own control again. "Did you just suggest something that most women would blush at?"

She looked up from her paper and tilted her head much like he had earlier. "Listen, I know your reputation for being the bad boy and a player around here. I don't care. Let's get this stupid waste of valuable time done so we can each go our separate ways." She explained, pulling out her history text book quickly out and opened to a page.

Kuronue leaned forward and looked at the page she had opened too. He had a feeling that he would have fun, even if he wasn't working with Kurama. One step at a time really.