"Good morning Akatsuki." The bronze-haired vampire was sitting by himself, Aidou nowhere in sight, as I bounded down the stairs towards him, determined to keep the bounce in my step despite a certain person.

"Taiyou!" Kain seemed surprised at the sight of me, which meant that Aidou hadn't said anything to him. "When did you get back?" He asked as I sat myself beside him.

"Last night. I saw Hanabusa. Did he not say anything to you?"

"Not a word." He was frowning now. Probably wondering why Aidou hadn't come straight to him with news of my return. He must still be mad. "So what happened?"

"I went home," I replied, the guilt of not telling Aidou and Kain still weighing on me. "After everything, I just really needed to get away."

"Why didn't you say anything? We were worried about you."

"I know and I'm sorry. I should have left a note, but I just had to get away."

We sat in silence for a few moments before Kain spoke. "Do you feel better?"

I nodded. "At least for now."

"Taiyou!"

I looked round as someone called out my name to see Ruka coming down the stairs, Aidou following behind.

"Where on earth have you been? Everyone's been worried sick."

"I know. I know. I went home for a short while. I just needed a little time away." I glanced over at Aidou, but he was staring straight passed me as if I wasn't there. He was definitely still mad. "'Morning, Hanabusa," I began with a smile. If he wasn't going to take the first step then I would. "Did you sleep well las-"

"Akatsuki. You were up early this morning." Aidou walked passed me to sit with Kain, completely ignoring me even though I was trying to make up after last night. Both Kain and Ruka furrowed their brows at Aidou before casting me a questioning look. I shook my head telling them not to worry about it. If that's how he was going to be then I wasn't going to bother either. Two can play at that game.


The time arrived for class and the Day Class girls were outside screaming, as per usual. Only, today they seemed even more excited than usual and my ears were already ringing from the noise.

"Jeez, what's up with them today?" I wondered aloud, asking no one in particular. Was there some event soon taking place that I had forgotten about? Seeing Aidou talking to Kain, still determined to ignore me, I called out to the taller vampire, interrupting Aidou mid-sentence. "Hey Akatsuki. Is there something going on that I've forgotten about? What's up with these Day Class girls?" I pretended not to see Aidou's fuming face as Kain shrugged his shoulders.

"Aren't they always like this?"

"Excuse me, Tai-"

"They seem more annoyingly loud today," I observed, cutting across Aidou as he began to scold me for interrupting his conversation with Kain. I, of course, pretended I hadn't heard a thing.

"Could you please stop-"

"Oh wait. Isn't the end of year ball coming up soon? Maybe that's why they're like this." I could see Aidou open his mouth to speak once more, but the gates were opening so I walked away having answered my own question without really need to ask Kain anything.

I strolled through the gates with a smile on my face having successfully got my own back for Aidou blatantly ignoring me when I was about to apologise. I was fully aware that doing this was only going to make things worse, but Aidou knew how to bring out the worst in me and if he wasn't going to listen then I wasn't going to bother.
All of that was driven from my mind, though, at the sight of silver hair and lavender eyes. He was alive. When I saw him standing at the doors to the Moon dorm the previous night it had taken everything I had to walk passed him without throwing my arms around his neck. I'm pretty sure he would have actually killed me if I'd done that. Now that I was over the initial shock I could walk past him with a smile on my face as if nothing had happened. As I walked by his eyes flicked to mine and I looked away immediately, hoping he hadn't seen me staring. I glanced back to see him watching me, that questioning look in his eyes that was there whenever he looked at me, as if he wasn't exactly sure what I was. As I was looking back I saw Aidou watching me, his head turning away at a guilty speed when he caught my eye. This made me laugh. If he wanted to talk to me all he had to do was apologise, then I could apologise and this would all be put behind us. "Stubborn vampire."


Zero

He watched her laughing as she turned away and disappeared with the rest of them, a strange feeling settling inside of him. She had been looking at him, her emerald eyes full of relief as she met his questioning gaze; she was glad to see him, but it wasn't he that had put that smile on her face. No, the person who had stolen her attention and made her laugh like that had been that vampire, Aidou Hanabusa, his blue eyes following her even after she was gone. What was the relationship between those two? They were almost always together, and if they weren't then the other was never far behind. He had often heard the Day Class girls talking about her, their jealousy growing more and more each day. What was she to him? What was he to her? But the question that Zero most wanted, most needed the answer to was why did he care? Why did he care about their relationship? The answer should be that he didn't, but even he couldn't lie to himself anymore and it made him hate himself even more than he already did; as if becoming one wasn't bad enough, he was now being bothered by concerns for one of them. His only consolation was that at least it was only one of them. The day he started to be concerned with the rest of them was a day he was sure was never to come. It was only her. But why? When had this annoying feeling started? It had seemed to come about so suddenly that Zero wasn't entirely sure what it was that had started it. He had seen her heading away from the group after class one clear night, but instead of immediately confronting her he found himself watching her as she disappeared amongst the tall grass. What was she doing? Why was she there? This continued for some time before he finally realised what he was doing and went to disturb her.

"What are you doing here…vampire?"

He moved through the grass towards her, his hand ready to reach for the weapon hidden beneath his uniform.

"So you found my hiding place." She sat up as she spoke, her eyes moving to meet his cold gaze.

"What are you doing here? You're not supposed to wander around after class is over." He began to reach into his jacket, but he stopped at the sound of her gentle laughter.

"There'll be no need for that Zero," she said as she rose to her feet, brushing herself down. " I wasn't doing any harm, just watching the stars." She made a gesture with her hand towards the sky, but dropped it as she sighed. "But you've ruined my peace now so I shall head back to my dorm." She turned her back on him and began to walk away, but she stopped at the sound of his voice.

"Why?" He asked. "Why do you come here?"

She stood there in silence for several moments and he was beginning to think she wouldn't reply, but then something flashed behind her eyes as she spoke. "To escape."

He still didn't know what possessed him to stop her that night, or why he had waited there for her to reply. All he knew was that he had seen something in her eyes. It was only for a second, but the pain that he had seen in that second was something he could never forget. Just what was it that this vampire was escaping from? What could possibly cause a monster so much pain? But Zero knew that this was something to which he would probably never know the answer.

He was suddenly brought back to the present when he realised that Yuki was in trouble. She was being pushed through the school grounds by the Day Class girls and she was helpless to stop them. Zero heaved a sigh, but he was smiling. That girl was little more than hopeless, but it was a hopeless he could deal with. That vampire, on the other hand, wasn't. It was pointless. One day she would be nothing more than a memory to a vampire hunter like him; just another name on a list. Ochiba Taiyou. She was something he wouldn't get involved with. Something he couldn't get involved with. No. He would push her from his mind as he had done so many times before and pray for the day when those damned vampires would finally leave the school, ignoring the dull ache in his chest as he pulled his thoughts away from those emerald eyes.


I'm sorry I'm such a terrible person. I had intended to have this up ages ago, but I kept putting it off and before I knew it days had become weeks. I blame it on Zero entirely. I had finally gotten to his bit and I realised that I had no idea how I was going to write it. I didn't want to do it in first person because I don't have the confidence that I can get his character right, but writing it in third was more difficult than I thought. Apologies and I hope it isn't so terribly awful, and thank you to those that are still sticking with me even though I am so terrible at getting chapters out within a reasonable time.