Ashlen looked stared at herself in the mirror on her vanity after throwing her messenger onto her bed. On her wrist, she hooked a magic bracelet that unfolded into a shield and strapped a small dagger with a jeweled hilt onto her thigh beneath her black, pleated skirt. She looked herself over in the mirror to make sure that her knife and bandages were not visible. She nodded at herself before heading out of the door. Knowing that the Day Class girls were already outside, she set herself onto the banister and slid down swiftly, her feet landing on the ground floor firmly. The impact stung her ankles, and she stopped to rub the bones that had clanged together. In her occupation, it was easy to wear out one's joints.
She jogged out of the dorm's large front doors and quickly made her way down the path to where the Moon Dorms, and surrounding Day Class fangirls, were located. As she got within hearing distance, she could already feel the pain of the piercing "KYAAA" sound that exited the girls' mouths. She inwardly sweat dropped. This is why she hated fangirls. They made the most annoying sounds.
Ashlen quickly made her way to the gates, knowing that she had a mission to fulfill. For her, tonight was the beginning of her true mission -to monitor the vampires. It was quite smart actually, Ashlen thought, having her become a prefect. She could take care of things outside, while Stella was able to observe the Night Class inside. It was a typical scenario in the Elite's strategies. The defensive members would be the ones to hold ground in a fight, while offensive members like Stella or Kazan, would drive the adversary off of their ground. Of course, Ashlen knew that they weren't fighting -yet- but she was sure the set up was to prepare for that type of situation.
"No, you can't get any closer. Get back," Yuki could be heard saying as she tried to push a group of fan girls. In response to her need for peace, the fangirls turned on her, accusing the shorthaired girl of wanting to keep the Night Class for herself. Ashlen hurriedly joined her at the front of the crowd, and began to help the smaller girl.
"Hello, would you please back up?" Ashlen asked politely as she stepped beside Yuki. The fan girls looked at with eyes full of hatred.
They don't respect me yet... Ashlen thought, inwardly sighing. She'd have to do something about that later, but for the moment, she knew that she shouldn't do anything drastic to them.
"Get back!" Yuki shouted once more, pushing the mass of teenagers away from the gates. Ashlen looked over to see what she was doing and began the less-effective-than-magic maneuver. Placing her hands on the crowd, she started to push against them with all her might. After a while of resisting the force, her arms began to tremble with the stress.
"Step away from the path!" Ashlen shouted to them as she pushed. A few of the girls were shoved from within the crowd while another few scurried out of the way. This caused a ripple through the girls near her.
"Watch it!" said a girl with curly hair as she pitched forward slightly. With a disgusted look on her face, she moved away and others in the crowd followed her example. She went to a different part of the crowd.
Ashlen was starting to get really annoyed. She didn't want to do anything drastic, but how far was that exactly? Maybe she could have a little harmless fun that could also result in helping her and Yuki. So she stopped pushing and gave a mean smile.
"Wow, do you practice that look in the mirror or are you really that ugly?" she asked bluntly. The girls looked shocked for a moment before becoming extremely angry. That's right, Ashlen thought, take the bait. Take it.
"Do you practice that one?" one of them said nastily back, matching Ashlen's sneer with one of her own. Another girl piped up:
"Why should we take sass from you, foreigner? You're not even Japanese!"
"You want to know why you should listen?" Ashlen asked innocently as she pointed a finger at herself. She smirked and laughed. "Let's just say you don't want to get on my bad side. Now, why don't you be good little girl and step back so the gates don't hurt you when they open."
The other girl growled at her and then huffed, before turning away. Apparently, she couldn't stand confrontation. A loud cranking sound came from behind Ashlen and the witch turned around on her heel to watch the large Moon Dorm gates open up. As one, the girls to the side of her let out an ear piercing screech that was worse than that of a banshee. Ashlen covered her ears and watched as the vampires filled out slowly, obviously putting on fan-service for the surrounding girls -and few guys.
Seeing as how she already knew that Stella was suspended, Ashlen wasn't surprised to notice that the werewolf was not in the crowd. Immediately, she wired her mind for her mission and took in the appearances of the vampires. Two blondes boys, one redhead and one with mahogany hair that were male, as well as a bluish haired female, a girl with long hair, and one with her orange hair in pigtails. Following them -although the rest were obviously not as popular with the fangirls –were brunette vampires.
So the blond haired blue eyed vampire is Aido Hanabusa, the blond haired greed eyed boy is Ichijou Takuma and is the vampire I met earlier. The dark haired boy with wine eyes is Kaname Kuran; the Pureblood and president of the Night Class and Moon Dorms. The tall red head male must be Kain Akatsuki and he is walking next to the Aido vampire. The information said they were cousins, Ashlen thought before moving onto the other vampires. The red headed girl with pig tails must be Toya Rima and the mahogany haired boy must be Shiki Senri. My information said they were models, Ashlen thought again before moving to the next vampire. 'I remember seeing her photo but I didn't catch her name. Ruka something I think, Ashlen thought again and frowned to herself. She was lucky she was able to read all that she could before getting bored. There were too many files to read through, even after splitting them with Stella. She only managed to get through six and a half before giving up.
The Ichijou kid saw her with the masses and then, as if reminded of something, went over to her. Ashlen gave him a strange look before he stopped walking. The boy smiled brightly at her.
"Hello Ashlen-san," he began. "How is your shoulder?"
"My shoulder is fine, Ichijou-san," Ashlen answered calmly even if she was very uncomfortable on the inside. Even if he was humanlike, he was still a vampire.
Ichijou's smile turned cheerful. "That's good. I would like to apologize for Stella's behavior. Um," here he paused to look back at where the vampires were, "if you don't mind me asking, how do you know Stella? I was a bit confused when I saw the two of you together."
Looking around at the girls that started to glare at her, Ashlen sighed and then regained her composure. "We are childhood friends, Ichijou-san. If you have any more questions do you mind waiting until there are no girls glaring down my back?" The girls did not intimidate her at all, but Ashlen had enough stress for today and didn't need any more.
Ichijou nodded. "Alright then. I apologize, once more, Ashlen-san. Stella has been suspended for two weeks. I thought you might like to know since the two of you seemed to be close."
Ashlen sighed and put a hand over her forehead, shaking it slowly in remembrance of Stella's reckless actions. "Thanks for telling me and I'm sorry if she is being a handful to you guys," Ashlen apologized back. Finally, she couldn't stand the stares anymore and spun around to face the girls.
"Stop glaring at me, you aemulator promiscua mula-canes!" she shouted, fists clenched with frustration. She insulted the females in Latin –the language of magic.
The girls decided that it was best to ignore her, although they did share disgruntled mutters and looks at being yelled at in another language. After that outburst, Takuma said:
"Well, classes will start soon. I'd best be going. I'll see you tomorrow, Ashlen-san," before walking to join the rest of his classmates. It was obvious he was taken aback by her outburst. It was impolite –something that was very different in the way he was raised by his grandfather. The other vampires looked at him with questioning eyes.
"Who was that, Ichijou?" asked the amber eyed Kain Akatsuki.
Takuma smiled at them. "It's the new prefect that Kaname and I met earlier."
"How curious," Aido Hanabusa interjected before looking at her suspiciously. It did not seem like a coincidence that another Day Class student had transferred in at the same time as their werewolf classmate. The blue eyed vampire assumed an expression pleasing to the feminine eye and strolled over to the newest prefect. He waved his hand in the air, paying attention to his precious fangirls as he was on his way so it didn't seem like he was targeting her specifically. Seeing what he was doing, Takuma said:
"Aido-!" but, knowing the effort was futile, stopped his sentence short. Ashlen continued to keep the girls away from the Night Class boys, fear consuming her that one might fall in the clamor and get scrapped or scratched. She knew that it was rude of her to pay no mind to the Ichijou boy's farewell, but having him say "I'll see you tomorrow" had greatly distressed the witch. She still held a fearsome, bitter hatred towards the Vampiric race.
"Hey girls," came a slightly irritating, nerve-grating voice. "Who's the new prefect?"
Great, Ashlen judged sarcastically, another vampire to deal with. The Day Class girls began a racket as they started complaining on how it was unfair that the new girl was able to be a prefect, and how they –members of the academy since it had been opened –were not. Aido went along with their sentiments for a while and Ashlen spared a look over her shoulder. Taking in the white uniform, disheveled blonde hair, and cerulean eyes, she deduced that it was indeed Aido Hanabusa inquiring about her.
Crossing her arms over her chest and turning fully around to face the boy who had come up to her, she asked sardonically, "Is there something you need…?"
"Aido," he supplied.
"Is there something you need, Aido-senpai?" This is getting worse by the second; Ashlen speculated pessimistically, more vampires and more KYAAA. I need to get a raise.
"What's your name?" Aido asked, his hands clasped behind his back as he rocked forward, a wide smile on his face. He was the poster-child of innocence, but Ashlen was not blinded by appearance. Once a bloodsucker, always a bloodsucker.
"Ashlen," she responded flatly. "Now that you know that piece of information, get to class. You won't be tardy because you were talking to me."
"That's not very nice," he pouted, sticking his bottom lip out. The surrounding female population, began to KYAA and AWW at the apparently "kawaii" expression on his perfect face. Ashlen took on a counteracting dead expression, making her eyes grow dull, and forced herself to look bored –all to hide her growing irritation at the fans. Inwardly, she cursed her boss for putting her into the situation. It was not fun in the least, and she was seriously regretting taking Kazan's proposal to join the Guild after the centaur had saved her.
"Actually, you're right," Ashlen told him, "I'm not really all that nice. I'd advise you not to make me angry. I'm not a prefect because I feel like it."
Aido sighed. "Alright, if you insist," turning towards his fangirls, he waved madly. "I'll see you beautiful ladies tomorrow at sunset!"
"Yeah, I'll be counting away the hours," Ashlen muttered to herself. Seeing that Aido had not moved on, she came up to him and smiled innocently. "If you don't leave right this instant, I'll show you the true face of evil."
"Scary!" Aido laughed, before jogging to where his classmates were. As he rejoined him, Ashlen saw his posture change as he began to speak with one of the other vampires –the red-haired boy who was said to be his cousin in the files she had read. Everything about the way that he pulled his shoulders in and leaned forward screamed that he was being secretive. Ashlen narrowed her eyes. She would have to watch out for this one. He could be trouble.
Turning off her mission mode setting, she groaned, "Sweet Mother. Is it like this every evening?" She watched as the girls walked excitedly back to their dorms as the Night Class hype died down. Shaking her head, she walked off, wanting to get somewhere to practice her magic.
Ashlen slipped back into the Sun Dorms, retreating up the stairs to her one-bed room. She was extremely exhausted from the day's events and night patrol. Luckily, nothing had happened and she had inevitably ended up sitting on a roof top to read her magic tome A Collection of Offensive Spells for Nature Element by Gul'dan Salazar. She probably should have paid more attention to what was going on around her, but she also knew that she needed to study up on her offensive magic. Sadly, though, she was still having trouble with the basic spells in chapter one. Her offense was terrible in the physical aspect, and apparently that transferred over to her magic as well.
She tucked the thick tome underneath her armpit and clomped up the stairs, not even trying to be silent in the early morning hours. It was a Friday night, meaning that most of the girls were probably still awake anyways. Friday means that Saturday is next. She sighed. She had to take Akira, the newbie witch girl, out tomorrow so that she could help her with her magic. Hopefully Stella would be able to come as well.
"U-Um," came a stutter from the shadows. Ashlen sleepily turned around, and saw Akira step out. The large busted girl pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose and crossed her arms. "Ashlen-san, I was wondering if I could talk to you."
Ashlen peered around Akira's shoulder and saw a pillow as well as a blanket and a book. "Were you camping here to wait for me?"
Akira nodded shyly. "Yes. I was just wondering if you could tell me where we should meet tomorrow to go out to town."
"Uh," Ashlen stared blankly at the other girl. "I don't know."
Akira, sensing the other girl's tiredness giggled slightly. "Why don't we meet at the front doors around 10? That way you can sleep in a little bit."
"Sounds good," Ashlen replied absently. Akira sighed and went to gather her things.
"I'll see you then, Ashlen-san. I'll be going back to my room now. Get some rest."
"I don't need to be told," Ashlen laughed before walking the opposite direction of Akira to her room. She was glad that she'd be getting some shut eye.
I hope you have enjoyed the latest installment. I apologize for it being late; however, I am very busy with life outside of fanfiction. Thank you for reading and I hope that you stayed tuned for the next chapter in this saga.
Reviews are demanded.