Vampire Mourning

"Hey," Cross Mayu shouted, "go back to your rooms! Stop pushing! If you're going to stay, stay behind that line!" Mayu frantically tried to control the Day Class students who were gathered outside of the Moon Dorms. Unfortunately she was too late and the gates of the Moon Dorms had opened. She was in trouble now.

"Please!" Mayu yelled at the girls.

"Excuse me. We would like to go to our classes, so if you would be so kind as to make a path," Nakamura Daichi, vice-president of the Night Class, said smoothly. "Let's give our school's Guardian a break."

The crowd of girls obeyed immediately. They couldn't possible not listen to one of their idols. Mayu smiled and gave a sigh of relief.

"Thank you very much, Daichi-sama," Mayu said without even thinking. She gave a quick bow, blushed and turned away. Daichi smiled and nodded.

The Night Class students moved quickly past the crowd, for they really couldn't have cared less about them. To some the Day Class girls were a pain; Mayu understood, for sometimes she felt the same way. Once the Night Class was far enough away Mayu blew her whistle.

"Anyone still here ten minutes from now will have detention for a week!" Mayu shouted. And she could make that happen.

Mayu snickered as the girls fled back to the Sun Dorms. That was probably the only fun thing about Guardian. It was an important job, though. Someone needed to guard the secret of the Night Class and Mayu was the girl. It was extremely important that the Day Class did not know that the Night Class students were actually vampires. It would have probably scared most girls to know this, but Mayu was raised knowing about vampires, it wasn't that big a deal.

Cross Academy had been mending the relationship between humans and vampires for years now with few slipups. Mayu's great uncle left her father in charge of the academy when he died. Mayu's father had no idea how to run an academy so he received assistance from the former Guardian, Kiryu Zero.

The sun was setting now as Mayu started on her way to the headmaster's office. She passed one tree and saw that the other Guardian, Mori Katsu, was asleep in it. Mayu took a deep breath and then hit Katsu in the stomach. Katsu nearly fell out of the tree because she had knocked the wind out of him. He jumped onto the castle path.

"What was that for?" Katsu demanded.

"For leaving me to take care of the Day Class crowd alone, stupid," Mayu replied. "Honestly, Katsu, you're so irresponsible."

"I don't need a lecture," Katsu mumbled; ruffling his messy, pitch black hair. He yawned and Mayu glared at him.

"I'm flattered, but are you really just going to stare at me?" he asked. Mayu blushed angrily, hit him again and continued walking to the headmaster's office. Katsu ran to be in front of Mayu and began walking backwards.

"Where you going?" Katsu asked.

"My father's office," Mayu replied.

"I'll go with you."

"Good, you're supposed to."

They paused to grin at one another. Mayu then walked past him and he followed her. They quickly walked the rest of the way to the headmaster's office. Katsu told her about his day along the way. Mayu listened to about half of what he said, because she was too busy wondering what to do about the continuously growing crowd of Day Class girls.

"Mayu," Katsu said suddenly. Mayu snapped out of her daze. Katsu pointed to the door of the headmaster's office that she had walked right past. Mayu blushed and went through the correct door.

"Don't worry just yet," they heard Kiryu-san mutter. "They are made to attract humans."

"Yes, but didn't you say that we should keep them as far away as possible?" replied headmaster Cross. "If too many try to get close to them, someone may find out."

"I think we should just be keeping a close eye on the Night Class; making sure that they do not slip up."

"Zero…"

Then Mayu decided to say, "Father."

"Mayu? Katsu-kun?" replied the headmaster.

"Hey," Katsu mumbled, not too pleased about Mayu giving them away. Kiryu-san glanced at the headmaster, muttered a farewell and quickly left the office.

"What's the matter with him?" Mayu asked even though she already knew. She had to, though, to make it seem like they had not been eavesdropping.

"He thinks his way is best and gets frustrated when I don't agree," replied Headmaster Cross. He wore a smile, but Mayu could see the worry in his eyes. Mayu pretended not to notice, while Katsu raised one eyebrow skeptically. However, he surprisingly did not say anything about it as he would if it was Mayu. Katsu put his hands in his pockets and looked out the window, almost thoughtfully.

"It's surprising how the Day Class can think about anything other than these insane tests your employees are slamming us with," Katsu said in his obnoxious tone. "Ha. I bet if those girls knew that they were in love with vampires –"

"Katsu," the headmaster sternly interrupted.

"Sorry, I forgot Mayu was one of their fan-girls," Katsu replied, leaning closely to the headmaster and holding up his hand to shield his mouth from Mayu. She still heard, which was obviously his intention. She would usually just ignore him, but tonight she wasn't taking any of his crap.

"I'm not a fan-girl!" Mayu insisted angrily. She punched Katsu, who started laughing and running away from her. She ran after him and he tripped her.

"It's obvious you love 'Daichi-sama,'" Katsu teased, imitating her voice poorly. Mayu jumped up from the ground and threw her arm around his neck. She then started rubbing her knuckles against his head. He broke her hold quickly, twisted her arms to behind her back and told her to say "uncle."

"Enough you two," the headmaster said, standing up. "Let go of her, Katsu."

Katsu obeyed, dropping Mayu on the ground. Mayu glared at him and stood up, but took no act of revenge.

"You should hurry and do your night patrol. Make sure no Day Class students –"

"Girls, you mean," Katsu interrupted. The headmaster shot him a look of annoyance and continued.

"– girls are out of their dorms."

"Yes, sir," Mayu and Katsu said in unison, then they saluted together and left.

As they walked down the hall Katsu began to slow. Mayu turned and was about to bark at him to hurry up when he cut her off.

"It surprises me how much you like Nakamura-kun considering how little you know of him and how little he acknowledges your presence," he said.

Mayu's cheeks burned as her mind instantly remembered earlier when Daichi had calmed the Day Class girls. He had helped her and smiled at her.

"I just admire how he's handled the Night Class while Hayashi-senpai is away," Mayu replied smoothly. Hayashi Leiko was the Night Class president. Leiko was conceited and power-thirsty, but was stunningly beautiful. So much so that it seemed to put some other girls to shame. Leiko was also a pureblood vampire, meaning she could Change humans and was vampire royalty. She'd been away on a trip, visiting relatives.

"Your cheeks disagree," observed Katsu.

"Whatever. Let's just get the patrol done."

Katsu chuckled but nodded. Mayu saw, as they neared the end of the hall, that it would be drizzling. Now she really wanted to finish the patrol quickly and she was sure Katsu would too. They didn't say anything for a long while. Because Katsu was usually rambling on and on, it was odd.

At that point it must have bothered Katsu a lot, for he jumped onto the railing on the side where there was no longer a wall. It made Mayu nervous, but she realized that must have been the point, so she ignored him. Then Katsu lost his footing and started rocking from side to side. Mayu swallowed a squeak of fright and instantly moved to grab Katsu's arm. He started laughing and "miraculously" regained his balance. He pointed at Mayu.

"You were worried about me," he observed with a grin.

"I'll push you off that thing," Mayu threatened. Katsu rolled his eyes. Mayu wished that Katsu could be afraid of her threats for once.

Katsu stopped suddenly. When Mayu tried to ask him to keep moving, he put his index finger to his lip, motioning to be quiet. Mayu obeyed and listened to the surroundings. At first all she heard was the drizzling of the rain and the run off from the castle's roof. At last she heard voices, three voices, coming from below. Mayu climbed into one of the trees, using a limb that had grown close to the wall, and managed to get to the ground. Once she was there, Katsu jumped beside her. Mayu felt more confident as she remembered she had her staff. The staff, her father said, that was used by most female Guardians.

There were three large boys from the Day Class, standing around each other, laughing and smoking. Mayu ground her teeth together as they threw their cigarette butts onto the ground.

"Hey!" Mayu said loudly. "What do you think you're doing?"

One boy laughed. The second replied, "Nothing."

"You guys are idiots," Katsu said, his voice stern. "Where the hell did you even get a pack?"

"Not your business," said the first.

Katsu laughed quietly at this and said, "Actually, it is. You can't smoke on school grounds. And pretty soon you won't even be allowed to leave campus."

"Aw, come on," groaned the third. The first boy tried to sprint away, but Mayu grabbed him by the collar of his shirt. She flashed a toothy smile at him.

"Not so fast," she murmured.

She and Katsu dragged the three boys back to the headmaster's office. By then it was completely dark out, which made Mayu a little nervous. Katsu glanced at her and motioned that they should go finish the patrol. Mayu smiled and nodded. They slipped out of the headmaster's office. They both knew it would be a boring walk, for those three fools were the only ones they were going to catch. At least, that's what they hoped.