"Dante, can we take a short break, please?" Saya asked him, about ready to fall down on her face.
He didn't seem to share the same sentiment, but lowered his guard slightly.
"Huh? What about all that determination you had before?" The silver-haired man asked her with a frown.
The momentary stop gave her time to catch her breath, even if it was in huge gasps.
"We've been fighting non-stop for hours now. I'm exhausted. I don't think I could move my body now if I tried."
His eyebrows rose and his grin returned.
"That so?" He asked before running forward and stabbing out with Gemonia, forcing Saya to sidestep.
He chuckled in response.
"Guess you're wrong."
She felt herself scowl at his immature methods of finding out if she could move.
"I'm serious! Besides, not all of us had pounds and pounds of nourishment that we require before coming here!"
He stuck a finger in his ear while putting on a bored expression.
"Told you that you could have some of the pizza if you wanted."
Through the gasping breaths Saya sighed.
"I meant blood."
Dante shrugged before casually strolling over to her and grabbing her sword, surprising Saya with his sudden movements.
He tightened his grip on the sword until it cut into his hand. Then he thrust it forward and rubbed the blood from his palm onto Saya's mouth before backing off.
"There ya go. That's all you're getting. Now come on."
She gave him her attempt at a cold stare while hesitantly drinking the blood until it was all gone.
The special ability of the sword took care of the rest and soon she felt normal again.
As she began to restart the battle, though, the door to the room opened and Nero entered.
Dante seemed disappointed by his sudden return but she was grateful, as she could still use a breather.
"What do you want?" He asked the man impatiently.
Nero barely regarded him while walking over to Saya.
"Your time to train is almost up. There is less than an hour left before you must prepare to leave." He told her.
She blinked in confusion.
"But we've only been training for a few hours now." She told him, sure that the night couldn't be over already.
"No. A full night has passed since I left you here. It is almost eight in the morning now."
It was surprising to her that time had passed so quickly while they were in here, but she was sure that they would be able to make do with the powers and abilities they had gained while training.
"When do we have to leave?" She asked him simply.
He waited a moment before responding.
"We have to get going by ten. But that refers to the time when we depart for the mansion. So, about an hour more of training. And another hour to get prepared."
She nodded, more to herself than either of them.
"Okay. Thank you. We'll leave here in an hour, and will meet you at the shop at ten."
Nero nodded and left again without a word.
Dante had been teasing her to get started, but Saya wasn't paying attention to him until now, interrupting whatever he was talking about.
"Okay, Dante. Let's continue." She said before taking a deep breath and running towards him again.
His eyes opened and Nero realized, with surprise, that he'd fallen asleep.
"I can't believe I allowed that to happen." He thought, trying to remember how long it could have been.
He always had a very good understanding of what was going on, even when he was sleeping. Because of this, his internal clock was always about as reliable as a real one.
From what he could remember and guess, it couldn't be much later than eight-thirty. Though he couldn't be sure until he checked an actual clock.
"I'll just go and see-"
Something holding him still kept Nero from doing so and he glanced down, seeing a slender, pale arm hooked around him.
Were he the kind of person to give overt physical reactions to things he probably would have shivered at the contact, but he wasn't, so Nero instead simply pulled the arm off him, waking up the girl who had been sleeping next to him in the process.
She crawled away in a pathetic manner as he stood up and worked any kinks out of his neck.
His eyes glanced down at her and he began to fear that she was going to throw up or something similar.
Going from being giddy and childish to quiet and depressed wasn't very common. At least not in the span of a few hours.
The only things he could think of that would do that were traumatic experiences and sicknesses.
"Can her kind get sick though?" Nero asked himself, curious if chiropterans, as they were called, got the common cold or flu.
With a mental shrug he walked over to her and started to turn her to face up so she wouldn't throw up on the floor.
But she shoved his shoe away and back-scrambled until she collided with the wall, not seeming to care about the collision's effect on her back.
It made him want to scoff, how strange this girl was. But then again she was only bait to get the other two to come as soon as possible. The only reasons he hadn't killed her before was, in addition to suddenly losing his taste for battle, there was no way to tell if Saya was able to discern if Diva was dead because of some kind of link between the two. Bait was no good in this case if it was dead.
Still, when she spat "don't touch me" in a strange almost manic tone Nero had to admit it still irritated him.
"Oh of course. If that is your wish." He responded, surprising himself that he was mocking her, even under the circumstances.
Nero normally wasn't a very sarcastic person; usually he just used straight-out insults.
But, like the other reactions she'd caused him to give her, it really wasn't all that significant.
It was somewhat amusing, however, that he had used that exact phrasing. Considering his "role" was being Saya's chevalier.
As he started to leave, she spoke up again, still not in a cooperating tone.
"Does that faucet in the bathtub work?" She asked him.
"Wonderful." He remarked in his head before telling her it did and leaving, still wondering what it was that had gotten her to act so strange.
"There's no way we'll be able to get back to the shop in time now, Dante!" Saya told him as they drove down a road towards Devil May Cry.
He was less-then-accommodating though.
"Don't try and pin this on me! You're the one who took so long to get changed! Not to mention my head still hurt's like a bitch from when you bashed it in with the bottom of your sword."
She looked out the window, trying to stay calm.
"It's your own fault for turning around before I said you could. And let's not forget your pizza-stop. How much of that can you possibly eat in one day? Not to mention that you never eat anything except pizza. My tongue would start hurting by now if that's all I ate."
He yawned, apparently tired from not taking a rest.
"Yeah, I can see how only drinking red kool-aid is a better diet. All those shades of crimson; such variety."
Saya sighed, hoping they would make it back in time.
It wasn't as if Nero wouldn't wait for them. But if the shop was attacked while they were away she doubted that Haji and Lady could defeat them with the weapons readily available.
"Would you please just drive faster? I'd be embarrassed if he had to wait twenty minutes for us to get back when we're planning on doing something as serious as rescuing my sister."
The car that they were driving in wasn't exactly modern, but luckily it had a top on it so she didn't feel too bad about squabbling with Dante in it.
"Yeah, about that guy. What "base" does that chest-tear count as? I can't really put my catching-mitt on it."
She gave an irritated sigh.
"Will you stop talking about that already?!"
He chuckled in response.
"Yeah, yeah. Alright. I'll drive faster. But if we get pulled over I'm making you pay the speeding ticket. Those bastards always show up when they get to bust you as a result."
"You don't say?"
"Oh, yeah. All five of my senses, and several minutes of fun, can back me up. Trust me, it's not the kind of thing a dude like me forgets. She's there."