She stared at the telephone for about five minutes now. Even after she found a book to read to pass the time, her eyes traveled back to the green object. He was supposed to call her about fifteen minutes ago and still nothing. She sighed lightly and went to retrieve the newspaper off her coffee table.

"May as well start looking for local job openings since someone hasn't responded yet," she grumbled.

Sayori Wakaba was now a college graduate and had applied to work as a tutor in Cross Academy for a little while. Kaien had offered the position to her since he had three spots open. She had the pleasure of meeting Yagari's new girlfriend and head tutor, Rosu Fang, and was a volunteer tutor for her senior year. She was quite surprised that the students liked her so much and was even more surprised by Kaien's silent payments for her services. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, he had begun to demand a different kind of service from her.

Kaien was a completely different person around her at times. One moment, he would be the "good guy" who would never harm another living thing if he didn't have to, and the next he was this... mischievous, childish,..., seductive man who wanted nothing more than to annoy the ever-loving shit out of her. Normally, Sayori didn't think about rude language describing her true feelings, but she was absolutely annoyed by the bipolar spaz known as Kaien Cross. Once upon a time, he was always there to help out. When Zero was down, he and Toga went through hell to bring him back to a "normal state." When she was down, he stayed by her side giving her counsel and hope. The more she spent time with him, the more she was at peace. Junior year of college, she and Zero had forgiven each other - after much convincing from Kaien and Toga, two very formidable forces - and made the best of their closing years together. She joked with him quite often during breaks. She hadn't gone back with her fiancé, but she managed to keep an open heart and found that she developed a love for Kaien. She had such a great debt to owe the man, and she thought she had found a way to pay it. Being a teacher wasn't what Kaien had in mind it seemed.

Now, Sayori just silently waits for the phone to ring or waits until Kaien bursts through her door like he owns her and the apartment. She had to give herself some credit, though. She was nervous. Kaien wanted to speak to her for an interview, but he had confessed that he wanted something else from her and it sounded like a difficult thing for him to say on the phone. Of course, if it was anything like that night, she would rather stay away from him as much as possible. Somehow, as her heart pounded, she wondered if that was a good thing...

About two years ago...

Zero, Sayori, and Kaito all graduated together in different majors but at the same university. They were excited to say the least, but they were in equal agreement not to squeal like idiots due to the occasion. After the ceremony, they joined with Toga and Kaien and went to celebrate at a restaurant in the vampire district. It was a bold move, but they felt it would mean something to Zero who had to adjust to being a night creature. He was still a human, though. He didn't prey on the living like some monster and remained the cool guy of the group who was easily provoked by Kaien's antics. As the men were talking, Sayori was happily eating a dessert and minding her own business as Toga and Kaito joked about getting Zero laid as a graduation present. When she looked up, Kaien was just watching her and smiled gently when she caught him.

"You're awfully quiet, Sayori," he started. "Would you like to try to get Zero some action too? That seems to be a new Olympic event between these boneheads."

"Who are you calling a bonehead?" Toga argued, gaining a mischievous smirk from the older vampire hunter.

"Zero is perfectly old enough to make his own decisions in who he decides to take as a lover or bride or whatever," Kaien says, breaking his chopsticks apart. "I don't think it's suitable to force him into something."

"Says the man who hasn't gotten laid in decades," Toga whispered, grinning evilly when Kaien spits out some of his food and turns red in the face.

"I'm ignoring you," Kaien grumbled, chewing his noodles and then swallowing. "So Sayori, anything on your mind?"

"Sure there's nothing on yours?" Toga asks, feeling the electric tension coming from the older man.

"I'm sure, headmaster," Sayori answers, smiling gently. "You know, women think about sex just as much as men do. When I was in class, the girls would sometimes get into some heavy stuff about trying to seduce the Night Class students. I think one girl actually tried to get in Kaname's pants. There was another girl who wanted Zero like that, but she was more interested in romance and being treated like a princess. Even in college, there were women who were only interested in this thrill of physical attraction and not being worried about emotional ties. I guess it's just the era of the independent woman."

"Aren't you independent?" Kaito asked, gaining Sayori's attention. "You've supported yourself ever since you left high school. You generally have no ties to your parents and have been with us for years. We, in general, are independent."

Sayori paused for a moment, thinking about her next words, and then said, "I guess I'm emotionally dependent because I rely on you all for comfort, but if you were just referring to my social situation such as finances and living arrangements then yes I am sort of independent."

"You're saying you're not interested in having sex just for pleasure is what Kaito is getting at," Zero said finally.

Sayori gasped at this and thought for a moment. Never allow Zero to take a philosophy or psychology class for an elective... With that in mind, though, he did make a fair point. Although she was never interested in the Night Class or Zero in that way, she was interested in another and knowing what life would be like as a woman who was betrothed. Too bad that didn't go as planned. Of course, she was able to feel something for someone else now. As she looked up into everyone's eyes, she noticed that Kaien held a solemn frown on his face but some other hidden emotion was dancing in his eyes. She had never seen that look from him before and looked to Toga for a hint. The older man, however, was fixated on his food as he stuffed his face with a barbequed rib. He always acted like some caveman around barbequed food!

She sighed, defeated on all fronts, and said, "I've never really been exposed to stuff like that. I was sheltered from sexual things. But... you know what, I take that back. I wasn't sheltered from anything. I never thought about men the way the other girls did. My parents never gave me the talk and I'm one of those people who doesn't think about things that aren't mentioned. It wasn't until my betrothal that I thought about anything sexual. I guess that makes me such a lame prude."

"You're not a prude," Zero commented sharply. "If it's not mentioned, it's not thought about. That's just how you are."

From there, the subject changed but the look in Kaien's eyes and the goal of getting Zero laid remained the same. While Sayori was getting ready to take a shower for the night, a knock on the door disturbed her. She was sure Zero said he would be out with Kaito. She dressed herself in a robe, careful to look through the door hole first before opening anything, and went to the obnoxious person knocking on her door. It happened to be Kaien who waved from the other side.

Sayori opened the door and greeted the headmaster, "Cross-san! What are you doing here?"

"Ah?" Kaien questioned with a tilt of his head. "I'm sorry. Are you busy?"

"I just got home," Sayori answered, eyebrow raised at Kaien's sudden boldness when he entered the apartment. He was certainly acting strange today. "I'm not terribly busy tonight and tomorrow is a free day. Is something wrong?"

"Yes, unfortunately," Kaien responded, sighing as he took his hair band out and let his locks fall about. His scarf and trench coat were also taken off and placed onto a chair on the kitchen table. Sayori didn't mind visitors, but she did mind when unexpected ones just marched into her territory and made themselves at home like some snooty bully. Kaien noticed the annoyed look on her face and then said, "You're a very cold-hearted woman."

"What?" Sayori replied, furrowing her eyebrows and placing her hands on her hips. He wasn't some bully. He was just rude! While he was the headmaster of a fairly good school, his status didn't give him the right to march in her home and insult her. How dare he? Sayori tightened the sash on her robe and went to the phone on the kitchen wall. She then said, "I don't know what's gotten in to you, but, if you don't leave, I'm going to have to call the police for you."

"I didn't do anything wrong!" Kaien defended with a snap in his voice.

"Cross-san, you barged into my home without my consent. That's called trespassing," Sayori argued calmly, holding the phone in her hand. "Now, please, either leave out or sit down like a proper gentleman."

"I've tried that! But apparently being a gentleman doesn't work on you!" Kaien blurted, face turning red from anger and a mixture of embarrassment.

Sayori raised an eyebrow at him but kept the phone in her hand when she replied, "Since when have you ever seen me around a jerk?"

"When your boyfriend dumped you," Kaien said softly.

His voice and his mood died down to something so sad that - for a moment - Sayori didn't respond and merely gasped lightly. The whole house became quiet. Hearing her bath water still running, Sayori took the cordless phone with her as she slipped passed Kaien and went to turn the water off. She entered her bathroom at the brink of tears. She thought she got over Haruma. She hadn't seen him since high school graduation. They never even tried to understand why the marriage was called off or what could they do differently to understand each other. Haruma just sat before her family, said he refused to marry her, and left her there. She lost Yuki, she lost Haruma, and she soon lost her parents. They didn't want to deal with her and her depression. They had the nerve to say something was wrong with her. She couldn't see through the tears burning her eyes. She whimpered softly, hoping no one would hear her, and then quickly wiped her tears and entered the tub. A bath will wash everything away.

She completely forgot that her radio was on as the soft sounds of piano playing filled her ears. Acoustic jazz always relaxed her but, no matter how slow she covered her skin in suds, she just couldn't forget the memories. She was so focused on cleansing her pain that she didn't hear Kaien come in the bathroom. She didn't even know that he was behind her, stretching his long, gentle arms around her body, and shushing her ever so softly as she struggled not to sob.

"You're so cruel, Kaien Cross," Sayori hissed, tears falling. "You've always been cruel. I could be at my happiest and you will always find some way to destroy me. You will always bring up such awful memories that I want to leave behind. I want to move on and yet you bring me...right back. Why do you hate me?"

"Because you can move on so easily," Kaien growled with a menacing snarl crawling in his chest like a hunting lynx ready to pounce but waiting for the right moment.

He then grabbed a nice chunk of Sayori's hair and pulled her head to the side with ease while placing another hand around her neck as she sat limply between his longer legs. She could feel his body tense but relax at the same time. Maybe this tension and relaxation was a form of eagerness towards something since she could feel her body being lifted and her butt touching Kaien's sensitive area. She didn't even bother to try to look at him. She just listened to him as he whispered huskily into her ear.

He said, "I wasn't treated as kindly as you may have been when I was a child. Even when I was depressed, I had no one to care enough to speak to me. There was someone who understood me... taken from me... before I even realized I held something between love and affection towards her. I became a part of her life and was trapped in this... circle... of seeking a balance between the masses who mistreated me. I was put into this position of never moving on in a world that will always move on whether you adjust to it or not."

"That has nothing...to do with me..." Sayori hissed, taking a hand to unwrap Kaien's grip on her neck but instead forcing him to tighten up a bit and raise her higher above his erect member.

"This..." Kaien snaps, spreading Sayori's legs wide enough for him to sit between her lips and reach up to her belly button. "Has more to do with you than you think, you cruel little bitch. I have spilled the blood of thousands just to be treated differently. I have taken on a role that I don't even want because of some tramp who couldn't keep her legs closed for her own brothers! I found a woman who knows my pain fully without even realizing it. She knows exactly what it's like to be mistreated because her family was doing it silently. She knows exactly what it's like to be lonely because her so-called fiancé dumped her before the wedding could even be planned. She knows exactly what it's like to be put in a place you don't want to be in but are thankful for it every day. She and I are one and the same."

"You and I are kindly cruel by ourselves, but together we are cruel in kind," Sayori responded, lifting herself up and putting Kaien's member inside of her hole as she descends onto him. She moans and blushes from the pain and pleasure but silently returns to her previous position of being under Kaien's spellbinding, closeted toughness. Without another word spoken between them, they spent their next few hours together in the bath water.

Zero was more than surprised when he saw the president's palace. There had to be two pagodas behind the mansion alone. Unfortunately, it looked abandoned for years and probably was due to his untimely death. Kaien took a deep breath and looked up at the home as if he was finally facing his biggest fear. There was nothing left to fear really, but it was the principle of the matter. The elder hunter led the way to the gate and surprised Zero when he took out a collection of keys from his coat pocket and unlocked the front gates to the fabulous mansion. When did Kaien have access to the president's home? He watched the man push the gate doors and followed him inside.

"What are we looking for?" Zero questioned.

"A safe," Kaien answered. "The president had a safe with records pertaining to himself. Vampire hunters he was close to, agents for hire, documents like his birth certificate, missions he was on, meetings and groups he was a part of. We just want a particular document that involves the Vampire Senate before Kuran took over. That's when he died. There was something that the president and the Vampire Senate shared. If we can find out what, it may help us and the agent you hired."

"Won't the agent be suspicious if we give her a document from the president's house or tell her that we retrieved it personally?" Zero questioned.

"I'm an agent for hire under the president," Kaien responded, sighing at the distance they had to walk from the gates to the front door. How did he not remember the stairs they had to go up? He continued, "The only one with the authority to enter the president's domain in this city is me. Toga became an agent for hire shortly before the president's death when he ran an investigation on Shizuka Hio and the connection between her and your family. When you began showing signs of transforming, he was told to drop the investigation and go to you. Toga had a prior investigation that caught the president's interest, however; otherwise, he wouldn't have been on the list."

When the men came to the front door, Kaien unlocked it and opened it. Inside was dark even with the morning sun beaming through the windows. The windows were either covered or painted a dark color to block out the sun. Kaien entered first to turn on the light and was shocked at how disheveled the mansion. It looked raided in already. Zero soon followed the man and caught the scent of a vampire lurking in the distance.

"Cross - "

"I know," he answered swiftly, walking to the middle of the foyer. He looked up to ceiling, keeping his eye on the painting of angels dancing across the clouds, and shouted, "Bookkeeper!"

The name echoed all the way to the top at the ceiling, shaking the crystal chandelier, and startling the dust from the walls. A croaking sound reverberated from the ceiling to the floor and woke the dust and glass that made the chandelier. Stripped pieces of paint crumbled from the ceiling and fluttered down to dance in the magical winds being formed in front of the vampire hunters. From the rug in the center of the foyer rose a marble foundation that created waves of wood and fiber material. Dust, paint, and glass formed a pedestal that cancelled out the waves and made everything stand still. Kaien was the first to catch scratching come from the walls and shoved Zero out of the way when a vampire came flying passed him to attack. Kaien swiftly took out his cane and cut the vampire on his shoulder, watching as the creature fell to his knees. Zero was about to shoot at the beast, but Kaien slapped his hand down and shook his head.

"Kaien Fucking Cross!" the vampire hissed.

It stood erect on his feet and revealed an elder man with the classic vampire red eyes and groomed silver hair. His beard was long and graceful as it reached to his chest. He was dressed in a long black cloak that covered a very clean navy blue tuxedo and shoes. The vampire healed himself instantly and stood before the vampire hunters with a proud stance.

He said, "How the hell have you been, kid?"

"You're looking well," Kaien said, smirking. The bookkeeper hadn't changed one bit! Too bad Toga didn't get to meet him yet. They would have a lot to complain about. He then said, "What are you still doing here?"

"I live here, stupid," the vampire said, walking to his pedestal. "What do you want?"

"Who the hell is this guy?" Zero demanded, feeling ancient power emanating from the vampire.

"Ah, Zero, this is the bookkeeper," Kaien introduced, smiling as though nothing was wrong. "He is the great-grandson of the first vampire to form a pact with the humans and protect them from his kind. His ancestry was one of the true beginnings of vampire hunter history. He allowed the president to live in his home and holds the records of every vampire hunter who was close to the president."

"And now you're gonna tell me that the silver pansy is Zero Kiryuu, right?" the vampire inquired. "I know about you. A pureblood killed your family as revenge for killing her lover. See what good sex will do to a person? You should know Kaien. I can smell your sins."

"Shut it, old man!" Kaien shouted. "That's not why we're here. We need to know why and possibly how the president was linked to the Vampire Senate. I know you're against the Senate in every way, but I figured you must know something that could help us."

The vampire hummed in thought and called into his hands the pages of a large book. He opened it and turned the pages to see what information he held. He then said, "There are no records here that give such evidence of a pact between your president and the Senate, but... there is a map that leads to a vial of blood. The blood is unlike the humans' and vampires' blood. Both a member of the Senate and the president were in search of it. The... black blood is the key to something, and the pool of holy water and silver coins it rests in was a means of keeping vampires away from it. Only a human can touch the vial, but not just any kind of human. A human with power can hold the vial in his hands."

"What could the president want with black blood?" Zero questioned.

"Kid, you're asking a little too much," the vampire said, closing his massive book. "I only know that the black blood was important to the president, but I can say this... For the blood to be placed in holy water and silver is weird."

"How so?" Kaien asked.

"Vampires aren't weakened by silver, just holy water, and nothing was said about where the vial or the map is. There is something else that wants the black blood, and whether the sun is up or down no other being except a human can hope to retrieve it. Maybe the reason why the president had agents for hire like you, Kaien, was to one day find someone with power who could."