Hannibal yawned as he sat on the couch. After that small verbal hit, he had calmed down enough for me to get off of him and for us to move our talk to the couch.

He stretched his arms up and yawned again. "I can't remember the last time I've ever been this tired."

"You're tired?" I challenged, looking over at him for the next seat cushion. "I had short hair this morning." I pointed to my now shoulder length braid. Wade wanted to braid it…I didn't question it.

He gave a louder yawn. "Shit. What time is it?"

I looked at my watch. "About seven fifteen." We had been chatting calmly for hours while Virgil went to a late class and Wade went on a job.

Hannibal groaned when he tried to get up from the couch. "I've got to get home."

"What for? The pizza is going to be here in five minutes."

He threw himself off of the couch and stretched some more. "Dinner isn't going to make itself."

I cocked my eyebrow in confusion. "Did you completely miss my call to Brunner's Pizzeria?"

"Not for me." He scrunched his face like he wanted to say something he shouldn't. "I really shouldn't be telling you this. But it's for my daughter."

I only smiled. "You have a daughter?"

He nodded. "Yeah. She's six."

My eyes brightened. "What's her name?"

"Anita." He began strapping his three different holsters back onto his person. He had taken them off when we settled on the couch and thrown them on the coffee table.

That smile of mine faded and a grey look dawned on my face. "Anita?"

He didn't notice. "Yeah." Hannibal kept beaming like the proud parent he was. "It, uh…was her mom's favorite name." His voice had an unusual shyness to it.

My head fell back onto the top of the couch. "Where's her mom?"

"She died." He said bluntly.

"Giving birth to her?" I asked, really hoping the answer was 'no'.

He just turned to me. "How'd you know?"

I gave a short scoff. "A friend of mine went through the exact same thing two years ago."

"Seriously?" He asked, squinting his eyes a bit.

I nodded. "Yeah. I mean the exact same thing. Baby girl, birth complications, named after her mom. Same name too."

He stood still and stared at me, almost afraid. "Really, now?"

"Yeah. But that was before."

He was lured in. "Before what?"

My voice cracked a little in sadness. "Before she became nonexistent."

Hannibal came over and patted my shoulder. "I'm sorry."

"It's okay. Her father doesn't even remember her."

"That's terrible." The dad in him became quite offended at my statement.

I shook my head at him. "Don't blame him, his memory was wiped."

Hannibal stopped again. "You lead an unusual life with unusual friends, don't you?" He stared at me with uncertainty.

"Yes." I answered simply. "One more won't hurt, right?" I looked up at him; that question hanging out there for him.

He sighed and ran a hand through his short brown hair. He shot his indecisive dark brown eyes to mine and said, "I'll get back to you tomorrow." And then he left through the door before I could say anything.

~.~.~.~.~.~.~

The timer on the desk in the front of the lecture hall went off a few days later and the much taller (than me, at least), older blonde man with hints of red in his beard turned and looked at the clock on the wall from the middle of the room. "I guess our time's up." He said with a smile and a heavy Norwegian accent. He noticed the class begin to pack up their things and quickly spit out, "If you didn't finish, take your labs with you and schedule extra time at the door!" His last word was lost as the door closed behind the last student. Or so he thought.

He sighed and turned towards the front and saw a lump of a student still hunched over their desk. He calmly made his way over to the student and sat down next to them, and chuckled softly when he heard, "Pick up the phone, Wally."

When he saw the student's hand twitch, he took it upon himself to wake them up. "Miss Hawkins?"

I jumped up when I heard my name and turned to look at the professor with wide eyes. "Professor Caulder? You are very close to me."

"Well, you were sleeping in my class…for the third time." He folded his hands on the desk and looked at me expectantly.

"I'm sorry." I apologized gazing at the desk, avoiding his eyes.

"Why are you so tired?"

I shrugged. "I don't know. A lot of reasons."

"Try me."

I looked at him with pleading eyes, but his stare was stronger than mine. I gave a loud sigh. "Fine. You really want to know? Because I'll tell you. You'll think I'm crazy, but I'll tell you. My brother has stopped bring who he really is for college, my best friend refuses to talk to me no matter how many times I try to call him, my sidekick is on this quest to become a hero when I have told him time and time again that he already is one seeing as he's saved my life countless times, and now this guy that I met years ago comes in to my life, we become friends, and then he leaves and says he doesn't want to be my friend!" I became angrier and angrier with every clause.

Professor Caulder just looked at me, 'hmmed' and nodded his head.

That really pissed me off. "Hmm? That's all you can say, hmm?"

"What else do you want me to say?"

"I want you-" And I stopped. He threw me a curve ball. That sneaky Viking. Nevertheless, my tired eyes gave a desperate message. "What am I supposed to do?"

"How should I know?" He responded calmly, very professionally. "I don't have a brother, my best friend talks to me everyday usually about this time, technically I'm his sidekick, and I try not to meet new people, save for my chemistry students."

I tilted my head slightly to the left. "Why?"

This time, he was the startled one. "Well," He began, not really sure how to explain it. "In my line of work, when I meet new people that I like, it…it fogs my mind and prevents me from doing my job."

"Teaching chemistry?"

He chuckled and shook his head. "No. My other job."

"What is your other job?"

"Hey, Caulder!" A voice came booming from the back of the room. "You ready for lunch?"

We turned and my eyes went wide when I saw him. "Hannibal?"

Caulder shot me a look. "Hannibal is the guy?"

Hannibal froze and his eyes darted from me to Caulder and back again. "Whoops, wrong room." He tried to leave but I darted up the stairs and caught up with him in the hallway, tackling him to the ground about fifty feet from the lecture hall. I pinned him like I had a few days ago.

"Miss Hawkins!" Professor Caulder ran after me. "Get off of him."

"Not until he answers my question." I grabbed Hannibal's plain white shirt and pulled him up slightly. Strangely, he did nothing to escape. "What's it going to be?"

He completely evaded my question and returned with his own. "Why do you want in so bad?"

I didn't really have an answer. So I came up with, "I'm bored. I need a new hobby."

"You think this is a game?" Hannibal sneered.

I shook my head and brought him closer. "I like to kill people. I'm good at it. Unlike Wade, I can't make a living off of it. Not that I need to, but it'd be nice to support myself. Anyway, there is one rule: I can't kill just anyone. I need a name and a reason. Now these vampires, from the way you described them, they seem like real assholes. That's enough of a reason for me." By the time my little spiel was finished, I had let go of him and he was sitting up on his own.

He took a second to think while Caulder was kneeling next to us, looking at the extreme tension between us. Finally, Hannibal spoke up. "Would I have to train you?"

I scoffed at him. "Please. I'd most likely be training you."

"Do you have your own weapons?"

"More than you can count."

In one swift movement, Hannibal bucked his hips upward, pushed me forward and off of him, rolled me over, and pinned me to the ground. A small smirk crept onto his face. "You want to get killed? Fine." He got up and began walking away like nothing had transpired between us.

"How do I contact you?" I called after him and Caulder as they walked away.

"I'll find you!" He waved back and kept walking.