Alright, exams are almost over, and due to the favorable responses, here is chapter 2.

Disclaimer: I do not own R+V and no copyright infringement is intended.

"Speaking"

My alarm clock was ringing loudly on my desk. I usually had trouble getting up in the mornings, but I was wide awake. I found it impossible to have gone to sleep after what I had seen yesterday and what I hoped I could have unseen. It would have been better if what I had gone through yesterday wasn't real and had just been some crazy dream. If someone had told me that, I would have believed them. There was no way monsters could exist in the world.

"Tsukune, get up already or you'll keep Mizore waiting!" my mother yelled from the first floor.

My alarm was still going off, so mother must have thought that I was just ignoring it. I really didn't want to see Mizore right now. As fine as things were between us, I didn't want to confirm my fears. If what happened yesterday wasn't a hallucination, I would probably start having a few more panic attacks from finding out what other monsters there were out there.

Although I was scared at the thought that I could see monsters now, I knew that I really shouldn't have been. My best friend was a monster and was a good person. We've known each other for years and she hasn't done anything to harm me. But I still couldn't help get the feeling that the monsters that I hadn't gotten to know would harm me in some way. I mean, what was stopping them from mauling me?

After quelling the butterflies in my stomach, I managed to pick myself up to turn off the clock and pull myself together for the day. With each minute that passed as I brushed my teeth, I began to wonder why Mizore hadn't told me about what she was before. I knew that I probably would have still had a mild panic attack, but it probably would have hurt Mizore a lot less than the one I showed her yesterday. It would have been on her terms and I wouldn't have been as surprised. Right?

Or was she afraid that I wouldn't have accepted her despite knowing the truth. I clearly was able to see that Mizore was Mizore after the initial shock. She had nothing to worry about. I knew that.

But did she know that?

After finally getting dressed and cleaned up, I walked done the stairs and found that Mizore was sitting at the table and helping herself to an apple. I gave a small mental sigh as I realized that parts of her still looked like they were made of ice like yesterday. It looked like I would have to go back to that creepy shop to ask the owner what was going on.

Despite my initial dismay over Mizore's appearance, I noticed that her monster form actually looked quite beautiful. The icy look for her hair glistened in the light. Her face was also paler than before, but it made her complexion appear flawless. I couldn't see a single blemish against the pale surface. All in all, her monster form actually made her look so pure.

The only problem I had with her new appearance was that I kept seeing the claws. Even then, she looked really beautiful.

Mizore noticed me and gave me a nervous look. She was still a bit scared about whether or not I could still see her monster form. She hesitantly called out to me.

"We need to go if we want to get to school on time, Tsukune."

I could tell she was just trying to prevent me from telling her that I could still see what she was. It was hard to blame her considering that I was so scared yesterday.

"Yeah…" I said and we walked out of the house together to go to school.

The sun was bright and the air was cool. Looking around, it seemed that most of the students in the area were already a bit far off in the direction to the school. They were too far for me to hear any chattering, so they would be very unlikely to hear us talking to each other.

As we walked side by side, we remained silent for a while. Even without looking, I could sense that Mizore was on the verge of popping another one of her candies into her mouth. It was awkward and one of us needed to step up. Try as I might, I found it hard to actually break the silence. Why was it so difficult to do so now when we both could speak naturally yesterday?

After working up a large effort, the most I could manage was to just place my hand on her head. I just brushed my fingers through her shiny hair to let her know that I didn't really mind her new appearance too much. As I was stroking her head, I felt it move towards me as she leaned to my side.

"So are you still able to see the real me?" Mizore asked quietly.

"Yeah," I said gently.

I was waiting for her to eat another piece of candy like she would always do, but she never did. I was sure that she would have been upset that I could still see what she looked like as a monster. Was she actually happy that I could still see?

I noticed that most of the students had actually pulled even further away and noted that that was probably a bad sign.

"Come on, Mizore. We really need to run or else we will be late," I said as I pulled one of her claws. I noticed that as I did this that my hand went through the claw until I managed to grab her hand. It looks like what I was seeing was really an illusion of some type if I could only grab her hand. We quickly jogged to the school hand in hand. Her hand was cool and soft like it always was. It wasn't cold and hard like the claws should have been.

When we actually made it to school, I instantly regretted coming back to school today. Several of my classmates now appeared with extra appendages, tails, lengthy necks, wings, and just about any feature that glaringly pointed out that they weren't human. I had to keep my cool or else these monsters would know that I knew what they really were.

Both Mizore and I just made our way to our class and seats so that another day of class could go by. Class would start soon and I would just have to focus my attention towards the lesson. I could at least ignore how my normal little bubble of a world had been crushed.

"Morning class! Let's have a great day and please behave yourselves," a very energetic voice came from Nekonome-sensei as she walked through the door.

My head immediately dropped to the surface of my desk. If there was really a god, he or she or whatever it was must have a sick sense of humor. Our teacher had come bounding in with a long tail trailing behind her and I could see that the top of her head was now sporting a new set of cat ears from the top. I could only ask the image of whatever deity was in my head one question. Why was our teacher a cat girl? If I had wanted to ignore the existence of monsters for a short while, it was made obvious to me that that wouldn't be at school.

"Ehh, is everything okay Mr. Aono?" the cat girl asked with a touch of concern when she saw me head drop down onto my desk with a resounding thud.

"It's nothing. I guess I was still a bit sleepy," I said sheepishly to cover up my small show. Although I said this, Mizore already knew that something was off for my reaction. Judging by how her eyes kept shifting between me and the teacher, I could guess that she was unaware of the fact that our teacher was a monster before. It looked like monsters really had no way of telling whether who was or wasn't a monster either.

"Well let's start the lesson shall we? Please try to stay awake with us, Mr. Aono," the teacher said innocently.

Although she had told me not to drift off, I still did. The lessons seemed to drag on and it wasn't until nearly the end of the first half of class did my attention actually get pulled back into the classroom.

"Before we all go to lunch, I would like to make a quick announcement. We need to pick two class representatives for this class, one boy and one girl more specifically. I know you just got to know each other recently, but are there any nominations? I'll even take self-nominations," Nekonome-sensei told to the entire class.

I am not even sure why I was paying attention to this part and not to the actual lecture since I didn't even want to be the class representative. Like Nekonome-sensei said, we just met each other and didn't even have time to get to really know each other. The only people who would get it were the ones that wanted it.

"I think Tsukune should be the guy's representative," someone cried out to the teacher.

I stand corrected. The first nomination wasn't a self-nomination. It came from someone who nominated a person named Tsukune. I don't recall there being a second guy named Tsukune. Even so, he must be really outgoing if people were already nominating him. I scanned the room to see if anyone was reacting to being called out. When I saw everyone was looking at me, I felt my attempts to hide away from the painful truth come crumbling down.

"Okay class. Who here thinks that Mr. Aono should be the class representative? Give him a loud applause if you think so," the teacher called out to us with a chipper voice.

Everyone in the class started to clap their hands at my unanimous inauguration. Wasn't there going to be at least one guy who opposed? Looking around, I wondered why the girls were even clapping considering that they would only have to be concerned about which girl they would sacrifice to the task. I also saw Mizore giving me two thumbs up. She knew I was trying to be a bit more social this year, but she still didn't understand that I wasn't getting into the position out of my own free will or for popularity. I was just the guy that got stuck with the job. Who did nominate me anyways? It's not like it mattered anymore, but I really wanted to thank the guy for handing me the job.

We still needed a girl representative and no one seemed to want to put out their own nominations or someone else. Nekonome-sensei gave a frown over the lack of enthusiasm we had. This class, despite how rowdy we were on the first day, was having a really hard time getting a second lamb. Why was it so easy to have put me on the altar?

The teacher gave a sigh. I was about to nominate Mizore before the teacher would complain about where our enthusiasm had gone, but a girl called out to the teacher in a gentle and slightly flustered voice.

"I'll do it, Nekonome-sensei."

We all looked to where the self-nomination came from. I saw a girl wearing a black choker and silver cross standing tall. She had long silver hair that managed to stretch below her lower back and, it had a slight shine from the light that ran down her hair. Her figure was also on the borderline of what most would call perfection if it was not outright called perfect in the first place. The skin on her face was also smooth and clear of any blemishes. Her entire image nearly screamed out royalty if it were not for the gentle feeling in that was exuded in her voice.

"Ms. Akashiya right? What does everyone else think?" the cat girl asked.

Everyone applauded, but the boys were much less enthusiastic compared to before. I noticed that many of the guys were giving slight faces of regret. They had all probably wanted to get to date the girl I was going to be working with for the rest of the school year. Karma, God, or some deity must truly exist in this world for the instant regret to set in for these guys.

The bell rang and people started to rush out in order to get in line for the cafeteria. The only people who actually stuck around after the majority were Mizore, a male student, the female class representative and me. I was about to get up to head to the roof with Mizore since we came with packed lunches, but the other girl in the classroom walked up to me.

"I'm Akashiya Moka, I hope we get along this year," she said with a hopeful tone, but she sounded less confident and more questioning in her greeting. I guess she was a bit afraid that since I had been nominated against my will I would be apathetic as well. Her red eyes were even giving me a look that made it really hard not to breakdown my natural shyness.

"I'm Aono Tsukune and I hope we do get along as well," I said as I gave her a small smile and with my hand extended for a handshake.

For some reason though, she didn't shake my hand, and she just moved out of the room quickly. My hand dropped to my side over the sudden change in attitude and the person who I had been talking to was replaced with the guy I recognized from yesterday. The black-haired guy looked exactly the same as yesterday except for the two leathery wings that were extending from his back and the long tail that was flipping behind his back. His yellow eyes were flitting up and down as though he was trying to figure something out about me. After he a while, he let out a long sigh.

"Man. Tsukune how did you manage to get her attention? Are you some sort of chick incubus and placed a charm on her?"

This is quite ironic. This guy was a monster and was accusing me of being one. If it weren't for my eyes, I would still be under the impression that the monster in front of me was also another normal human guy. That being said, I got the feeling that he was trying to figure out whether or not one of his own kind was actually here and possibly interfering with whatever high school debut or plan he was going to do.

"What makes you say that? I just thought she didn't want Nekonome-sensei to get frustrated like yesterday," I said with a slightly cautious tone.

With that, the person who I was sure was an incubus walked out. He was giving me a small wave to wish me luck with my new duties. Even though he was doing this, the image of his tail gave a quick swat at my face to indicate obvious irritation. I guess my natural luck or misfortune with girls hurt his pride as an incubus.

Seeing how no one was in the room anyways, I motioned to Mizore that we should just eat lunch in the classroom today. After giving me an inquisitive look with her stoic face, she gave a small nod. Although I had wanted to be more outgoing and make more friends, I could already tell that that ship had sailed. The guys in our year would probably hate me or show jealousy over the fact that I would be spending a lot of time with Moka. They probably should have waited for the girls to have decided their representative before assigning me the task.

As we ate, we were silent for almost the entire time that we were eating our lunch. It was always like this. I would always have to be the one to initiate the conversation with Mizore because she was so shy. Usually I would have begun the conversation earlier to break the awkward air, but I found it difficult today. I really wanted to know why she had hidden her identity from me all this time, but I was scared that doing so might do irreparable damage to our friendship. I found myself trying to work up the courage to ask several times, but almost every time my mouth couldn't speak.

"Are you interested in that pink-haired girl?"

I saw that Mizore had actually stopped eating and had her chopsticks gripped tightly in her hand. Her other hand was already below the desk, probably because of her habit when she was nervous. I wanted to calm her down and stop her from getting another piece of candy. The only problem was I had no idea what she was asking.

"What pink-haired girl?" I asked hesitantly. I was starting to get an idea of who she was talking about as soon as I asked this, and something told me that I wasn't going to like what Mizore would confirm.

"I'm talking about Moka… of… course…" Mizore tried to say coolly, but her voiced had trailed off in the end as she too realized the situation.

Students were now filing back into the classroom as the lunch break was over. Our conversation was cut short since we couldn't reveal that monsters existed to our human classmates. Our teacher came in, and I sat through the class with worried thoughts floating through my head.

Despite the initial worry for the first half of the afternoon class, I felt myself calm down a bit. Moka may have been a monster, but she actually seemed like a nice girl from my first impression of her. Plus, she probably wouldn't do anything to me in the first place since it would bring too much attention to her. We weren't exactly in position where our disappearance could be overlooked.

There was only one thing that bothered me. Like the incubus pointed out, I had to wonder if Moka was actually interested in me in some way and how so. She had willingly volunteered and introduced herself to me, but ran off after just greeting me. While it could just be because she was shy, it was frightening to think about what other reason she could have to explain her actions.

The bell rang before I knew it, and both Moka and I were given our first task as class representatives. We were both sent out to the lab room to take inventory of the chemicals and tools. As we began to walk out the door, I couldn't help but see Mizore in the corner of my eye. She was already popping another piece of candy into her mouth.

As we walked down the hall, I noticed that the pink/silver-haired girl kept fidgeting around me. She kept on taking deep breathes and would always try to turn away, but only look back at me again. Was she actually interested in me? It couldn't be possible, but then what exactly was she so nervous about?

We eventually made it to the lab and started to take note of everything we would need for the lectures to come. As I sorted through material, I would tell Moka how much of everything we had and she would write it down on the inventory sheet we were given. Occasionally I would hand her something to check if I wasn't sure what it was. Each time that happened, our hands would brush briefly and I would shudder at how close I was to a monster in a near isolated situation. It was nerve-wracking. Resuming the work was even worse as I had my back turned towards her, and I got the distinct sense that she was staring at my back instead of looking around the room like a normal person.

"Hey, Tsukune, did I do anything to offend you?" she asked dejectedly after our work proceeded for quite some time.

I couldn't help but turn around when she said this. I saw that she was looking at me with a face that was bordering crying. Years of instinctively taking care of Mizore surfaced up at the image, and I shook my head because she had done nothing.

"So why are you acting so nervous? Did you hear rumors about me from when I was in middle school?" she asked with the same tone and look on her face.

Thinking back, I was really tense since the end of class. My body was very tense, and I was more or less silent throughout the whole time. My natural survival instincts, shyness and underdeveloped ability to accept the whole concept of the monster world made it hard to just openly accept anyone who wasn't human. It honestly made me feel disgusted with how I couldn't look over the fact that I knew that she wasn't human. If I didn't have these eyes, I probably would have been ecstatically jumping for joy for being able to spend after school hours with such a beautiful girl. She even seemed like such a nice girl.

"Sorry, I'm just really shy. I haven't really talked to girls too much besides my cousin and Mizore," I answered her. It wasn't right for me to just treat her so poorly just because of my initial misgivings.

My response instantly turned her frown upside down. Her smile made me feel better about myself. I was at least giving her a chance to be friends.

"Would you be my friend, Tsukune?" she asked with a glimmer of hope in her red eyes.

I really couldn't say no to her even if I really didn't want to be her friend. Those innocent and begging eyes just made it impossible to say no unless a person was literally heartless.

"Sure," I said strongly.

The moment I said that I felt myself tumble to the ground. This girl just tackled me to give me a hug and laughing from sheer joy. Was she really that lonely that she would just hug someone she just met? Who was I to complain? A pretty girl was giving me a very affectionate hug. She was even babbling, "Thank you. Thank you. We're going to be the best of friends... and ... this smell… I can't…"

Wait a second. Why was she smelling me? A bite into my neck soon answered my question. It was so sudden and I started to feel lightheaded. The pain didn't even hit since I was so shocked.

Moka was quickly pulled away from my neck after a few seconds by Mizore. My hand instinctively swatted to where I had been bit. I couldn't feel any holes or actual bite mark, but it still hurt from having actually been bit on. I could actually feel the tears starting to well up on the corners of my eyes from the pain.

"What do you think you were doing to Tsukune?!" Mizore cried at Moka. I was so glad that Mizore cared so much about my safety that I didn't really mind the fact that she had probably just been stalking me today.

"I'm sorry! I just lost control for a second! You just smelled so tasty that…" Moka stammered as whatever possessed Moka was clearly still dulling her mind, but it only made Mizore more infuriated about what had just happened. I saw Mizore's claws reach up for Moka's throat. Whether or not the claws were actually there or just in my vision, Mizore clearly had the intent of possibly killing Moka.

I had to stop Mizore from doing something drastic. Before she could continue, I wrapped my arms around her to give her a hug. Both of her arms were restrained under my own, and her claws were gripping my arms. She struggled for a while to break free, but eventually relented once she realized that the only way to break out would hurt me in the process.

"It's okay, Mizore. I'm still fine so you don't have to do something I know you will regret later," I whispered into her ear. I noticed that like her appearance implied, she felt really cold to the touch. I had never felt her so cold before. Was she actually always so calm and collected because of her powers? Was she always using those candies to help control her powers too?

The silver-haired girl looked at us with an apologetic face and had a dejected air about her now.

"I'm sorry you two. I'm a vampire, and I ended up sucking on your blood after just meeting you. It's probably best if we try not to talk to each other anymore. Please just don't tell anyone that I'm a monster," she begged us. I could see tears in her eyes well up as she began to walk out of the lab.

"We're still friends right?" I called out to her.

Mizore shuddered for a second at my attempts to call Moka back. Moka even whipped her head and hair around at my question with her red eyes gazing at me. A lot of questions were clearly building up behind those startled eyes.

"Drinking blood is just something you have to do. I know that you are probably a really nice person. Just please ask me beforehand if you need blood next time," I said loudly to show I wasn't just saying it. With each sentence, I could feel Mizore begin to grip my arm tighter. It was really cold.

Before Moka could respond to my continued friendship, I asked her to go hand in the inventory sheet to Nekonome-sensei. Even though I said that, we all knew that I really was trying to talk to Mizore alone. Moka nodded and headed to the faculty office. When I didn't hear her footsteps anymore, I let go of Mizore and turned her around to face me.

Mizore was crying. Her tears were dropping to the ground and made solid clunking sounds. The tears were freezing as they fell. I hated to see her like this. She had only broken her stoic face a couple times before, but the most painful one I had seen her have before was whenever she cried. There was only one other time when I had seen her cry, and I made a promise that I wouldn't let her cry again.

"Why do you treat her so normally? Why weren't you scared of her like you were scared of me yesterday? I've known you since we were kids and you were still scared of me! You have only known her for a day! Not even a day! She even hurt you! So why are you treating her so nicely?" Mizore sobbed out.

I embraced her once more. She was so cold and I could feel some parts of me go numb from it. Mizore was shaking a lot from the emotional stress she was feeling. I could feel how fragile she was physically and mentally as I held her.

I whispered to her, "Because I know that you are still scared that I won't be able to see that Mizore is Mizore. I know you are worried that just because I can see that you aren't human that I will abandon you. It hurts me to see you in so much pain from this, and I don't want you to feel hurt from me being scared of monsters. I'm trying not to be scared anymore so that you don't have to worry. I'm not going to up and leave you because you're a monster. We've been friends forever, and I don't want us to split apart for something as stupid as this."

The shaking gradually died down and I could feel her warm up. She wasn't sobbing as much as before. I began to brush her hair like I always did to make her feel better. I held her like that for a long while with the sound of the clock ticking away. The seconds melded together as I stood there comforting Mizore and assuring her that everything was going to be alright. I could even see the sun beginning to set through the window before Mizore had finally stopped crying and gently pushed me away.

We began to go straight home since neither of us wanted to go the shop today. We were both emotionally and physically tired. As we walked side by side, I couldn't help but feel that someone was staring at us from behind poles or bushes. It was probably Tsurara considering the fact that she had always wanted to be a spy or secret agent.

I sneezed as I realized how cold I had gotten. Before Mizore could do anything like fuss over my health, my hand was already stroking the top of her head. When I did this, I didn't feel Mizore shuffle about for her candy, and I could feel the eyes watching us fade away. My gut instinct also told me that if it were Tsurara, she knew that I knew about Mizore's identity now. Tsurara knew how close Mizore and I were, and she also knew our habits. Anything out of the ordinary would be a sure sign to Tsurara.

"Tsuki! Mizi! How are you two doing?" a familiar voice resounded from a park we were passing by on our way home. It appeared that Kyouko hadn't gone home yet.

"We're fine!" I called out to her as she walked towards us. Whenever I saw her, I always got the feeling that she wasn't my cousin but my twin. She literally looked like a female version of me. She even had short hair that looked like mine to a certain degree. The only real difference between us was that she had green eyes while I had brown, and we both had almost opposite personalities. It was also a sad thing to say, but she was definitely the masculine of the two of us. Were our genders just mixed up when we were born?

"So how is high school treating you two lovebirds," she playfully teased with a wide smile on her face.

Kyouko always teased at how close we were. Every time she did that, Mizore would go blush and look away and I would just have a hard time responding. Today was different though. I was just so tired today that I just let it slipped so that I could just tell Kyouko how school was.

"It's interesting. I got nominated as class representative and probably became the envy and source of hate for many of the guys in school," I sighed out.

"Class representative? But no one wants to be a class representative," Kyouko said with a look of confusion on her face. It was only there for a second as a sudden realization dawned on her. It wasn't hard for her to figure out since she acted like a tomboy and hung out with guys more than she did with girls.

"So do you think that she is pretty, Tsuki?" Kyoko asked inquisitively. She also had a somewhat dirty look on her face. Kyoko always did acts more like a big bro and occasionally sis when it came to my love life. Right now could be a toss up between both given the content of the conversation.

"Remember what you told me 'love guru'? All girls are pretty all the time, especially if they ask," I said with an unamused look on my face.

"Oh you are learning," Kyouko said with her chest puffed out. It also seemed like her nose was growing from her pride that she taught me so 'well'. The only thing was that I was still single despite her advice, so I don't see why her ego was getting so inflated. I'm not even sure why I still remember her advice.

I was about to ask if Kyouko wanted to walk home with us, but she asked if she could talk with Mizore in private. When I asked what for, she said it was girl talk. Although it confused me at the fact that my cousin could act like a girl at times, I went home alone. It was probably best for Mizore since Kyouko was probably the only girl outside our families that she talked to. Mizore didn't even seem the least bit upset about being left alone with Kyouko. Mizore didn't get another piece of candy.

As I walked back home alone, I began to wonder about whether or not my eyes were a curse or a blessing. After today, it was evident that whether or not I had gotten my ability to see the truth the monster world would have shown itself to me. Would I have still tried to befriend Moka if the monster world had been revealed after she had sucked my blood?

As I wracked my brain for an answer I would like, none ever came up. Only one ever came up. I wouldn't have accepted Moka. The answer felt like a kick to my side because it showed how shallow I was. Even if she had sucked my blood, she meant no harm. She had just lost control to her natural urges, but she had clearly valued the idea of my friendship above all else.

But the problem was that it was her natural urge.

If today was my first impression of monsters, I probably would be a nervous wreck if the subject of monster came up again. I'd probably hurt Mizore in the process because she too was a monster who I would have come to hate. The very thought of losing a friend that I had known since we were both little was too depressing for me to linger on.

I guess these eyes of mine are probably a blessing. I wonder what I will see tomorrow.

Author's Note(s)

#1: Please favorite and follow if you liked this story. Any and all reviews help. Send questions and I will probably respond to some of them by the next chapter. I do read them and consider editing previous chapters for better flow or explanations.

#2: I just realized that between this and Face of Humanity, I literally just switched the personalities between the two Mokas based on how the story mechanics worked. Go figure. At least I know that some people out there are probably really enjoying reading about how inner Moka is acting like the outer Moka. (To figcube: I guess I technically do have both versions of Moka, it's just one is just a personality and the other is just a body.)