Yuu was late, so very very late. Crap Yuu thought, Guren is going to kill me. He thought of all of the ways that Guren would prolong his death. It will be slow, slow and painful. He'll bleed me dry and sell me to the vampires, I just know it. Actually, that was way off the mark, Guren would never do anything that would assist those blood-suckers.

It didn't matter now, he realized as he rounded a corner to Guren's office. He stopped in his tracks and immediately did a 180. Of course, he had to choose right now to take a wrong turn, how many times had he been to Guren's office? He also took this time to realize that he had forgotten one of his shoes or one of his shoes had fallen off while he was running.

With luck, Shinya would be there to lighten the punishment, Guren was always calmer around Shinya. There was nothing that could make Guren's eyes burn with hatred and malice while he was around Shinya.

Thank God, Yuu thought as he rounded a corner and saw a singular black shoe on the floor. He maneuvered the shoe so that it was at least upright and jammed his foot into it, not thinking twice. The shoe was falling off of his foot, he could feel it, slowly slipping off, but he paid it no attention.

He barged into Guren's office-the right office this time-and was immediately confronted by the stares of five people Shinya isn't there, he noted somewhat reluctantly. He took the time to look around the room, Kimizuki was leaning in the corner, so stereotypical of him, being anti-social right off the bat. Yoichi stood next to him, and he stood as if he had just been talking to Kimizuki until Yuu had barged in. Shinoa sat cross-legged on the floor, with a dozing Mitsuba curled up on her lap. Worst of all, however, was the man with violet eyes staring incredulously right into the depths of his soul.

"Sorry, Guren." Yuu said reluctantly, "I was a little side-tracked on the way here and I may or may not have overslept." He figured the last was quite obvious as it looked like he had just had sex, which he hadn't of course, but he certainly moved around enough in his sleep to give the impression that he had. And this was often pointed out by the children who would share a bed with him back in the vampire city.

"And what, do tell, got you side-tracked so that you would be this late to our Top Secret and Mandatory Meeting?" Guren asked, with no mercy in his eyes. His eyes never broke contact with Yuu's, but Yuu could tell he was taking in every single part of his appearance. Yuu tried to nonchalantly hide the half-on-half-off shoe behind his left leg and fix it without Guren noticing, which was infact useless and pointless as it only brought attention to the foot in question. "And you even came here in less than complete uniform? What is wrong with you?"

"See, now that's the funny part," Yuu started to explain, "You see, when I was running to your office, I guess I hadn't fully put on my shoe and well, it kinda fell off, then I took a wrong turn on the way here. So that and oversleeping is the main reason why I'm late." He tried to pass it all off as no big deal with one of his amazing smiles that could make anyone else smile, well almost anyone. He had yet to see it work on Kimizuki or Guren. And it didn't work this time either if anything it made him frown even harder.

But just at that moment, the door burst open again to admit a slightly more ruffled Shinya, who also apologized for being late, later than Yuu, infact. His hair was tousled like he had just woken up, and his shoes were untied as well. It didn't seem like he had tried as hard to look presentable, but then again, he did have a higher position so maybe he didn't have to try as hard.

Guren stared at the man standing in his doorway, leaning down on his knees, trying to catch his breath. Something in his eyes seemed to soften when he looked at Shinya, and a slight pinkness appeared on his cheeks. "And why are you late, may I ask?" Guren asked, but with less malice than he had for Yuu.

Shinya looked up at him and smiled, "Do you really want me to answer that with them in the room?" Shinya's face was red at this point too, but if it was from running or blushing, Yuu didn't know. "After all, it is primarily your fault, and I don't want to see you brought down in front of your squad."

Guren turned away at this point and walked back to his chair, which was positioned away from his desk, maybe when he sat in it he liked the dramatic effect that happened when someone entered your office and you could spin in the chair to greet them. However, he seemed to compose himself before he turned around.

Meanwhile in the corner, Shinoa had woken up a groggy Mitsuba, but nevertheless, the girls were both laughing at the exchange that had just happened between the two men. Kimizuki looked bored with life, but that was no different than usual. And Yoichi had turned red in the ears, and mouth agape. Yuu didn't understand what had transpired between Guren and Shinya that would bring that reaction from him, so it surprised him.

Guren spun his chair so that he could address them all properly, and when he did, he was as composed as he had been when Yuu first met him. Guren intertwined his fingers and peered over them, staring at each individual in turn. "So, now that we are all here, finally might I add, we can get back to what we actually came here to do." He reached down with one hand to open a drawer and bring out a manilla folder. "We have reason to believe that the vampire city is the weakest right now than it has been in awhile. Many of the nobles have left the city on different orders and only a few remain, however they are extremely powerful."

Guren let the contents of the folder spill out onto his desk and gestured for the rest of the group to gather around. Yuu could see several graphic pictures of various children in white and black outfits being led by a man in a white cloak with no hood. A noble Yuu thought, I wonder how high he's ranked, he couldn't see this guy being able to take him down, but Yuu had learned not to judge based on appearances.

One of the pictures caught his eye though, even though the pictures were all in black and white, he could still see the light purple hue to the long hair on that ugly person. The person was smiling, showing off his two perfectly white, sharp fangs. Even though Yuu knew it was just a picture, his desire to rip Ferid's head from his shoulders was suddenly revived.

He could tell that Ferid's cloak was white and pristine, just like his uniform, but Yuu couldn't help but see the man drenched in blood. The blood of Akane and the blood of Mika. He was suddenly brought back to that night, the white room only amplified the darkness of the life that was seeping from his family's bodies. The horrible red color staining their clothes, and the looks on their faces.

Their faces were filled with despair, shock, and pain. Their eyes were staring lifelessly back at him, trying to tell him something, trying to tell Yuu that they would be safe if it wasn't for him. But worst of all was Mika. Mika was supposed to be smiling, with his beautiful eyes crinkled around the edges just slightly. There was supposed to be a light in them. Instead, there was a dullness that could only come from despair and failing. His wonderful face had been violated by the blood that streamed down from his mouth.

"Yuu. Are you listening to me? Oi! Yuu!" Kimizuki promptly slapped Yuu on the back of the head. "Oi! when someone's talking to you, you should at least make it look like you're listening, "Kimiziki said, disapproval shining through his features. Yoichi stood slightly behind Kimizuki, with worry written on his face. Yuu clenched his hands at his side as tight as he possibly could, any tighter and he was sure he would draw blood.

"Huh? Oh, sorry. What were you just saying?" Yuu pried his eyes away from the picture of the man who had taken his life from him. If ripping the picture would do anything to harm the blood-sucker, Yuu would not hesitate to shred it.

Kimizuki let out a long and hard sigh, "It wasn't me who was talking to you, it was Guren, who else would want to try and get something through your thick skull." Kimizuki glared at him, but Yuu had become accustomed to it and promptly ignored it.

"As I was saying before I was so rudely ignored by someone," Guren started again. "The city is as vulnerable as it has been it awhile. With this in mind, the Hiiragi's have assigned us the job of infiltrating and assassinating the main nobles that have chosen to reside there for the time being. Now, why this job falls to us, I have no clue, our only real member with assassination skills being Yoichi, but besides that, Shinya has volunteered to assist us on this suicide mission.

"We have one goal, to kill Krul Tepes and any others who side with her, so basically, we are to kill any and every vampire that we can, with Krul our top priority. We will most likely die, but we need to take her down with us. Understood?" He made eye contact with each and every one of them gathered in his office, each one nodding in understanding until he reached Yuu.

"Hah! I could kill them all on my own, just sending me would be enough. There's no way that they could kill me. I've gotten much stronger in the four years that they failed to kill me." Yuu proclaimed happily, although, despite his cocky attitude, he was worried that even the seven of them wouldn't be able to take the queen down.

Mika crouched in a corner, his breath quickly being exhaled in short puffs, creating white puffs that drifted ever upward. He gripped his chest as tight as possible, the pain was consuming him. His whole body seemed to be freezing, but his blood was fire that pumped through his veins. It was unbearable.

But Mika pushed through it, he needed to push through it. There was no way that he was ever going to become like the others. The others who needed the blood but drank even when they weren't hungry. He needed to calm down. He slowly and carefully forced himself to take in more cold air through his nose, and expel it through his mouth, creating more and more fog.

When he finally composed himself enough, he reached into his pouch on his side and pulled out his last vial of Krul's blood. He looked at the liquid and sloshed it around in the vial, hating what it was and hating that he needed it. Closing his eyes and undoing the top, he downed the metallic liquid in one gulp.

Then he left for the throne room, as much as it pained him to do so, he needed to do it, he needed to get more of Krul's blood. He hated himself for needing it, but he hated himself even more for wanting it.