Chapter Two: Of Knights and Zero

She had always associated him with the image of a knight—her knight—in shining armor, however fantastical that may have been.

And if he ever got wind of her thoughts, it wouldn't be surprising if he dumped her in the nearest mental hospital and beat a hasty retreat back to Cross Academy…although, given that they did go out on night patrols and regularly interacted with the vampires of the Night Class, she wondered about their sanity in the first place.

But being his childhood friend and the only person he willing spent time with on a semi-regular basis, Yuuki often saw a side of him that few others did not.

He was everything true, noble and honest (if blunt to a fault) and Yuuki hated to see that he was slowly, but surely, losing his path amidst the darkness of his past. Although he had never spoken a word to her about his past, and she had been unable to get anything out of the Headmaster, she knew that whatever had happened simply could not be described in words. That it was something too traumatic, too painful for words.

After all, Yuuki herself had seen firsthand the devastated mess that Zero had been in when he had been brought by the Headmaster that one wintry night. It was a deeply buried secret that he had no intention of telling anyone and one which she had no intention of prying out of him.

Nobody could accuse Zero of being friendly, in fact he was anything but, yet he had always managed to acknowledge her in some way, whether it was an insignificant nod or the slight exasperation in his lavender eyes upon seeing her (and yes, she did take pride in this fact for it meant that he had accepted and resigned himself to her constantly being there to annoy him).

Now however…

She sneaked a peak at him as they were walking back to the dorms after prefect duties and bit back a sigh. His cold, handsome face was stony, devoid of any expression, silver locks falling haphazardly in his eyes and bore an aura of bone-tired weariness that made her heart ache. Yuuki took another look at him, brows furrowing in concentration the longer she gazed at him. Under the moonlight, he seemed even more unapproachable, more distant than she had ever seen him. More alluring, more handsome…

That was, until the finely chiselled features she had been studying turned towards her, and Yuuki was met with that impassive amethyst look. Zero didn't say anything but his intent was clear and Yuuki found herself having a hard time explaining just why she was scrutinizing him so hard. Put under pressure and with no viable reason for staring at him, Yuuki blurted out the first thing that came to her mind.

"Have you considered being a model?"

…which of course left something to be desired. Such as the lack of forethought, apparently.

On the bright side, her question at least managed to elicit some sort of a reaction from Zero, even if it was just a slight frown as he no doubt tried to understand her logic.

"I mean…you're…good-looking enough…" Yuuki trailed off sheepishly, turning her head to avoid his piercing lavender eyes. "That's-what-the-other-girls-keep-saying-so-it's-p robably-true-not-that-I-think-you're-ugly-or-anyth ing."

Then, unbidden, a small smirk appeared on Zero's face, one that Yuuki did not see as she averted her eyes to the ground in embarrassment after her latest rapid-fire ramble.

"And you." His soft voice broke through her mortification, but by the time she raised her head Zero had already disappeared down the path, as quiet as the night.

"Hey Zero! Wait for me!"

As she scrambled to hurry after him, Yuuki was left to wonder exactly what his cryptic words meant.

"Take the derivative of x and…are you listening?"

Having been caught staring at him again—twice in the one day—without a good reason, Yuuki gaped stupidly at Zero before blushing furiously. The pencil she had been tapping against her chin rolled away with a clatter, further adding to her embarrassment.

It really wasn't her day today, or her week, come to think of it. She still hadn't forgotten the horrible mess that she had made in the kitchen while attempting to bake a cake…and she was willing to bet that Zero hadn't either, after she had roped him in with the clean-up. Then she had failed a math test (that the teacher had been more than happy to let the rest of the class know), which had resulted in her running to Zero for help and hence the current studying session.

And now to have been caught staring at him like some spacey love-sick schoolgirl—

"I don't like you!"

"…"

His eyebrow rose.

Well, there she went again, making a complete and utter fool of herself.

"I mean, I like you. Not in the like like way, just—"

Just not yet.

Slumping forward dejectedly, Yuuki idly wondered if she could knock herself unconscious by banging her head against the desk, but deciding against it as she as more likely to hurt herself than actually succeed.

Then realising it was a bit rude of her—actually, a lot rude of her—to slouch on the desk and interrupt their study session when it was Zero who had taken the time to help her, Yuuki suddenly sprang up again, much like a jack-in-the-box.

The problem with springing up without warning, as Yuuki found out, was that she didn't take into consideration the environment around her, namely the fact that Zero had come to investigate what was wrong with his ditz of a prefect.

"Ouch!" Yuuki cried, feeling the top of her head meet with a hard, unyielding object before collapsing back onto the desk, jarring her chin against the wooden surface. Maybe she would have to reconsider the idea of knocking herself out on the desk. "Ouchie…"

Said hard, unyielding objected also grunted in pain and Yuuki twisted slowly to see a grimace on Zero's face. Apparently, he had gotten up from his chair and had been hovering over her when she did her jack-in-the-box performance. She gave a weak smile in response to his glare, his pale hand rubbing the abused area on his chest.

"Sorry! I didn't mean to…you know…spring up so suddenly. Are you okay?"

"Idiot," Zero muttered, but Yuuki could hear the affection in his tone as he returned to his seat.

She felt her smile grow wider upon seeing the slight twitch of his lips, almost as if Zero wanted to laugh but was restraining himself. Yuuki watched with unabashed pride as the twitch turned into a smirk and his whole face relaxed, replacing the stony indifference with something infinitely warmer.

On second thought, today hadn't been so bad after all.

Not if she had managed to make Zero smile.

AN: Thank you to all the reviews, favourites and follows of this story- they really motivated me to write this chapter that bit faster! Are either Zero or Yuuki OOC? I try to write them in character, but if you think they're acting/thinking in a weird way, please let me know so I can fix that.