Gasp. The first chapter. Woot... I think. xD I personally feel like this chapter is pointless...well the second part anyway. 'Cause the first part is pretty important. It was supposed to be longer, but it's 5 AM and I'm really tired. On top of that, I think continuing the chapter would've made me write out a whole bunch of unnecessary crap. But...sorry it's short! D:

Just so you know, nothing actually happens in this chapter...or the next I think. But things should start picking up by the third chapter. :)

I had been planning on writing the next part to Fallen Humanity (FH), but this wouldn't leave my head, so I just had to write it. :D But FH will be next! Cause I can't get that out of my head either. And when that happens, I can't write anything else because my mind is SO focused on that one thing. Is anyone else like that? Or is it just me? o.o

Hm...I feel like I'm forgetting to tell you guys something... Oh well. :) I'll remember sometime...in the not-so-near future. xD

Zero woke with a start, his amethyst orbs automatically giving his room a glance in panic. So it had been a dream… But it had felt so real. He had felt everything...

He continued eyeing his room before he sighed in relief and shifted so that he was on his back. He winced slightly, but shrunk back into his bed, covering himself with the covers that he had tossed aside while he was dreaming.

He briefly glanced at the clock on his nightstand. He had slept his way through the first three periods of school – it was lunch already. He saw no reason for even attending today. His body was rather sore from the last mission he had…which had been almost three days ago.

Zero shook his head, brushing it off his shoulder. He had fought four level Es singlehandedly, and to his surprise it was anything but easy. He shut his eyes, letting the dream play in his mind again.

Zero rarely had dreams, and when he did it was usually about Shizuka's attack if not the years he had spent under the Headmaster's care when he was a child. The dream had to mean something. He just had to figure out what. He thought over the dream again, trying to figure out the deeper meaning. He could feel it there, but he couldn't find the words to actually describe it. It felt like…

A knocking interrupted his thoughts. He rolled his eyes. Yuuki sure had a way of showing up at the right moment.

"Zero Kiryu, I know you're in there. And so help me if you don't open this door, I'll kick it down," Yuuki shouted from the other side of the door.

"And not only will the Chairman force you to eat something of his as punishment for breaking his door, you will have the pleasure of invading my privacy and seeing me naked," Zero retorted. He wasn't really naked – he had shorts on. But he knew it would stop her from breaking in.

In the hall, Yuuki's nose scrunched in disgust and she flinched away from the door. It wasn't as if she hadn't seen Zero naked before, but they were kids when she had. She huffed in annoyance, "Alright, but if you're not out in ten minutes, I'm going to tell Headmaster that you missed two days of school."

The hunter shook his head. He knew that the Headmaster really wouldn't care. Zero kept his grades up despite his sleeping in class and constant skipping. But he also knew that if he didn't get up, Yuuki probably would break down the door with her knocking. He flung his legs over the side of the bed, wincing again. His body was really in pain…

He shuffled toward the sink and mirror head had in the corner of his room. The Chairman had specifically had this room built for him, due to the fact that he had been changing and needed as much privacy as possible from the other Day Class students.

Zero yawned and rubbed his eyes, leaning over to prepare his toothbrush. His eyes were focused on the running water. He spit out the tooth soap and rinsed his mouth with water, his eyes danced over the mirror and back to the sink.

He tensed, spitting the water out and glancing at himself in the mirror again. What the hell?

His face covered with blotches and his lips were incredibly swollen and he could feel them bruising over the already visible bruises. His eyes lowered to his neck. Large hickeys covered it, leaving almost no room for his skin to show. And underneath he could see that his neck was nearly gnawed to his bone. The lower his eyes went, the more damage he saw. His body was covered in bruises – most already there and the others forming. Not to mention the other bite marks that were nearly hidden by them.

"What the hell?" He repeated out loud.

He remembered the fight with the level Es being slightly more difficult than usual, but he knew they hadn't done this much damage. Zero was left in a state of bemusement as he replayed the fight. Neither of them had gone anywhere near his neck, let alone his face.

"What. The. Hell?" Zero murmured for the third time. He stumbled over to his bed, sitting down as his eyes continuously roamed over his bruised body. The focused on a part of his legs that looked slightly darker than the rest of his body. He lightly ran his fingers over the area, eyes widening when he realized that they were indents. He lifted his shorts a bit, finding that there were multiple sets of the same indents on his thighs.

Zero shook his head in disbelief. How he had managed to end up in such a state, he didn't know. He was surprised that he wasn't caked with blood. Perhaps his sluggish vampire healing had allowed his wounds to close before he bled to death…

He sat on the bed, once again running over the fight with the level Es. The marks on his legs were probably from the degraded vampires, but even so, Zero shouldn't have had that many marks on him. As for the others, he couldn't recall.

The day after the mission, he had skipped class, in favor of spending the day sleeping in his bed. The day after, he had skipped class once again, but that time it was to go into town. That same night, he was forced to attend a gala one of the noble vampires had thrown – by order of the Association, of course. But that was it. He hadn't done anything physically to gain such injuries.

"Three more minutes Zero!" Yuuki shouted.

Was she still there?

Zero rolled his eyes, raking a hand through his hair (flinching when he saw more of the indents on his arms and wincing). There was absolutely no way he could go out looking the way he did. He could hide his body under his clothes, but he couldn't hide his blotched face and puffy bruised lips. And his vampire healing wasn't the greatest, seeing as how he wasn't a born vampire or a level C. So it would, at least, take a day just for his face to heal – sans the lips. His lips would take another day.

"I'm staying in my room."

He heard Yuuki huff once more and a thud follow after shortly. He guessed she had stomped her foot the way she usually did when she was annoyed with him. "Zero! You haven't been to school for two days!" She paused to chew on her lip and rest her forehead against his door, lowering her voice. "I'm worried about you… You've either been gone or in your room. Are you sick?" She paused again. "Are you…hungry?"

Zero allowed a small smile to grace his face. It was so like Yuuki to check on him. And it was so like her to be – or at least try to be – a self sacrificing heroine. But it hurt him to know that all she thought he wanted from her was her blood. "I'm fine, Yuuki."

She lifted her head as if Zero had opened the door and pet her on her head. "Are you sure? Everyone is at lunch now, so we should be alo-"

"Yuuki," Zero warned. Really the girl just knew what buttons to push sometimes.

Yuuki frowned, stepping away from the door. She eyed it; almost waiting for Zero to open the door, but when he didn't she turned to leave. "All right. But if you need me later, I'll either be at the Chairman's house or patrolling."

Zero hummed in response, listening as Yuuki's footsteps sounded throughout the hall. He glanced at the clock. A half an hour more and he would be able to sneak away to the Chairman's house to get something to eat. Yuuki would be back in class by then.

His stomach growled at the thought of food. "Yeah, yeah," Zero muttered. "I'll get you fed."

He lay back slowly, wincing and hissing silently in the process. His backside was probably the only body part that was in pain beyond recognition. He'd had to stop for a minute, blinking away the black spots that was slowly clouding his vision. Eventually, he was at a full laying state and he relaxed his body into the bed.

Really, all he had wanted to do at that moment was sleep, but another growl came from his stomach, fiercer than the first. He shut his eyes in an effort to ignore the growls, but was forced to get up (very slowly) from his bed and get ready for his short trip to the Headmaster's house.

He silently prayed that he wouldn't run into the Chairman.