Nowhere

I'm trying to convince myself to write longer chapters, oh well, at least this is up. After this I'll be in the thirties, whoop! My life long dream. No, not really, my life long dream is actually to become an escape artist. Oh well.

Chapter Twenty Nine

"Is he angry?" I asked Riku sitting down next to him on the couch in the otherwise empty room. He replied with an almost hostile shrug and I withheld a depressed sigh.

I expected everyone to be angry with me, it was pretty much a given but now that the weekend was over I was slowly coming back down to earth.

Once I got off the bus and into the building I ran face-onto-chest with Shin, whom was standing on the first step of the staircase.

In some far corner of my mind I dimly realized that Agon must have took one of Apollo's cars because he wasn't ever on the bus.

Making up an excuse about a project in Workshop I followed Shin straight to Hiruma's room. He set the pace and we were able to make it to Hiruma's room five minuets quicker than normal. Shin, as usual, didn't talk but it wasn't like I had any questions to where we were headed.

I was only slightly surprised to find Riku in Hiruma's room and could tell right away he was angry with me.

But why no, I had sort of lied and escaped from Deimon in order to spend the weekend with Jyuumonji. The only thing I had going for me was the camera, which I was keeping linked to my side.

Even though I would be forever grateful, Jyuumonji wasn't much of a photographer; half the pictures had his fingerprints covering the photo.

But it was better than showing up empty handed.

The front door flew up and Hiruma marched in with Kurita and Musashi in tow. I could only remember their names because I've seen then around Hiruma so much. "Hiruma-san!" I greeted bowing, slipping into Japanese out of habit.

"Before you yell or a-anything I've got the photographs of Agon-san's house you wanted. Please don't blame Jyuumonji – I swear he doesn't know anything about, um, you guys. I know that I acted irresponsibly by leaving after you told me not to, but, um, I'm sorry!" My practiced speech ended weakly, I hadn't practiced that far ahead.

"I know, I know." Hiruma said causally mentally throwing me off balance, he didn't sound angry! Wait, why didn't he sound angry?

"Aren't you, er, mad?" I asked curious.

"Like hell, now hand over that camera." He said impatiently. I blinked and held it up to him, weird, that went a lot better than I had planned.

Hiruma flipped through the digital camera grunting at the quality of the photos. "Fine, you can leave." Hiruma said causally glancing at me over his shoulder.

I blinked surprised; I probably had sat there worrying longer than it took show up. Since I was already standing I slowly made my way to the door muttering 'hello' to Kurita and Musashi.

Stuck in shook I didn't realize until we out of the hall that Riku had followed me. "Sena, let's go to my room, unlike Hiruma I need you to tell me what happened." I nodded in agreement, too stunned at my good luck with Hiruma to argue.

Riku's room was bare expect for one lone cardboard box stuffed in a far corner and a bed that looked unused. "Whoa," I said before I could catch myself.

"Yeah I know it's not as big as Hiruma's room." Riku said causally and I shook my head. "Oh that wasn't what I was thinking of! It's just that, your room is nice." I finished simple and Riku rolled his eyes gesturing to the bed.

I sat down and scooted over to make room for him, making sure to take my shoes off before they touched the sheet. "If you say so Sena, now I would like a detailed explanation of what on earth was so important that you had to leave for."

I was already tired of lying so often and gave Riku a pretty honest rundown of my weekend. I just sort of skipped out the whole running into Agon part and the hugging Jyuumonji thing.

"Urg, that's just like you Sena, risking your life because of some promise." Riku shook his head before giving me a suspicious look. "Hey, did you stop running after school once I left?" He asked and I shrugged.

"Well, actually, I just sort of ran errands for a couple of people instead, so that's sort of like practice." I explained and Riku hung his head dramatically. "You're kidding me, all that training for nothing!?" I laughed uneasily, he looked pretty down.

"Riku-kun, you never did explain to me why you decided to teach me – you don't have to tell me why you were there, just why you decided to help me out." Riku shrugged and sighed.

"Fine, well, the thing is, awhile back, when I was still human," he kept pausing as if trying to figure out how to start out. I rubbed my arm fighting the rising goosebumps that sounded so weird, that Riku didn't even consider himself to be human.

"I had a friend; she was a lot like you, really. Always apologizing and getting into insane situations, she even had a similar attitude, there wasn't anything bad or secretive under the surface, she put herself out there." He smiled wistfully and I could feel a little bit of my soul slip away.

"She?" I repeated dryly, I didn't really sound like any of that, I was just Sena – not that I wouldn't like to be the admirable girl he was talking about, I just couldn't imagine putting me in the same category.

"Yeah, but that was awhile ago." Riku said ending with a shrug.

I blinked and gave a curious look. "How old are you anyway?" I asked and Riku shrugged. "Um, I was born in 1924 so that makes me," he counted off his fingers a couple of times. "Around 85 I guess." He nodded confirming the numbers in his head.

"A-and you haven't aged at all." I muttered and he sighed not as pleased as I was. "That's kind of the reason I didn't want you to change Sena, being immortal…it's not as great as you'd think." I nodded swallowing with some difficulties.

Immortality, no one mentioned that yet.

"How old is Hiruma then?" I asked and Riku shrugged. "I wouldn't know, after the first decade age doesn't hold the same value as it use to when human."

"But how can you-"

"Sheesh, Sena are you planning to question me all night long? How about we talk about something, other than vampires," He suggested in an almost desperate tone.

"What do you want to talk about then?" I asked innocently and Riku frowned and a silence quickly slipped into the room.

"Explain to me exactly what you meant by 'sort of ran errands'" Riku said crossing his arms, expression serious.

--

"Whoa, Sena! Where have you been?" Monta asked the second I walked into the room. "Er, I had to go, um, see the nurse for a check up on my, er, health." I stumbled nearly falling on my bed.

"Huh, cool, guess what? Mom's feeling all depressed that Pitt ran away and offered that you come over for the weekend. Mona's away on some school trip to Washington so it's almost like we have the whole house to ourselves." I smiled and was almost about to agree when, well, I remembered.

According to Hiruma I could just 'turn' at any moment, and I wasn't sure if I should try to test my chances again.

But so far I didn't feel any vampire-ish urges, I ate garlic, didn't feel any urge to turn into a bat yet, and the thought of drinking blood made me nauseous.

(I searched 'vampirism' online and while the majority of the sites made the whole ideal pretty scary and all facts a little unrealistic; it was more than what the real vampires told me so far.)

"Um, I have to ask the Principal he said I…had to ask." Monta deflated slightly but didn't press. "Where has Yuki been?" I asked switching the subject to avoid awkwardness.

"I'm not sure, but he'll surely show up once he's done doing whatever he's doing, finding the cure to cancer or whatever." Monta said and yawned. "Well, it's nine already, I want some sleep. The bathroom is open if you need anything." He muttered sinking into the bed.

I reached down for my bag and blinked realizing that it was missing. I searched around my bed, even going so far as throwing the blankets off my bed then looking under it.

No bag.

"Turn the lights off." Monta muttered stuffing a pillow over his head.

Wait, I thought backtracking mentally, I never took it with me out of Hiruma's room! Duh.

"Oh, I'll be right back; I left my bag in the, um, yeah." I flipped the lights off and shut the door behind me. Silently I prayed that Hiruma's door wasn't locked or that someone was in there, preferably someone less scary than Hiruma.

I had barely made it halfway when I heard Agon's voice, loud and angry. Glup.

"What the hell, you fucking trash! You told him!"

I froze in mid step, just in time to hear Hiruma crackle in response. Wait, what?

--

Yeah, I remembered.

I decided to stop eavesdropping; it only led to trouble. But despite my promises I stood rooted in my spot. Why was Agon talking to Hiruma? And did he know what I knew? But what did that make him? What about Hiruma's vampire or dead policy?

I didn't have any plans to leave until I figured something out.

"Now, who on earth could you be talking about?" Hiruma asked, his tone taunting. I flinched mentally, why did it seem like Hiruma was always trying to pick a fight?

"You know who, that damn kid." Agon growled and muttered something I didn't catch. They had been speaking relatively loud and it wasn't until now that I had to struggle to hear anything.

I inched closer to the door and lightly pressed my ear against it; hopefully no one would walk past and notice how suspicious I looked.

"Ah, him, the one who came back here smelling like shit; brown hair, brown eyes, about…this tall?" I groaned inwardly, okay it was clear now; Hiruma was really trying to pick a fight.

Slightly self-conscious I sniffed my sleeve, I still didn't get Hiruma's obsession with me stinking.

"Yeah, and human, what the hell?" Agon growled and I swallowed nervously. Okay, that made it pretty clear that Agon knew about the vampire thing, or at least the majority of it. Probably more than me.

"It's a long boring story, I don't believe your brain capability will be able to function it, so I'll save you the trouble and not bother explaining." Hiruma crackled.

"Don't give me that shit." Agon snapped, not amused. I was mildly surprised though; I wouldn't have thought that anyone could survive after calling Agon stupid. Then again though, it was Hiruma, I guess.

"There's a slight chance that I've already attempted to transfer blood, and there's the slim possibility that nothing happened." Hiruma said causally and I jumped away from the door hearing a loud crashing noise.

"What the fuck did you say?"

My throat was dry; I hadn't needed to be pressed against door to hear that. My heart was still pounding from the sound of smashing; the fact that I was the reason why Agon was angry wasn't helping.

Actually I was surprised that they couldn't hear my heartbeat, after all it was racing at an alarming tempo. "You fucking heard me, and you know you're paying for that, right?" Hiruma crackled, not sounding worried by Agon's rising anger.

"Don't change the fucking subject, why the hell can't the kid be changed?" I frowned feeling insulted, why was I just 'the kid' all the time. However, it was probably better that Agon wasn't calling me by name. Then I would have a real reason to be scared.

Hiruma didn't respond right away and for a moment I worried that they left the room. "His blood proved to be…unaffected by the vampire blood." He said, his taunting tone gone. "Then try again or just cut the kid, hell, if they knew what you're risking here."

"No," Hiruma snapped and I smiled surprised that he was standing up for me. "There is still the possibility that the blood is just taking longer, anyway this is too valuable for the sake of science. Not to count that adding any more blood would surely kill him."

Ah, never mind.

Agon snorted before replying, "And letting the kid do ?" He must have been talking about the weekend; actually I had been wondering the same thing.

"I checked Kazuki Jyuumonji when he first came in, he didn't have the slightest idea why the shrimp headed into your precise domain." I shivered, poor Jyuumonji, Hiruma interrogated him. I mentally reminded myself to thank him again the next time I saw him.

Oh and apologize for that stupid hugging thing, I still wasn't sure what had came over me. Oh yeah I almost forgot, he had pretty much saved my life by hunting down the camera and taking pictures, without asking any questions to why.

"And the kid? What's going through his head?" Agon asked causally.

"He spends all night dreaming about the mysterious Agon in a very romantic fashion." My face reddened and it was all I could do not to run into the room and scream 'that's not true!'

Agon remained silent, probably trying to determine if Hiruma was lying or if he should break something again. "You can't tell can you?" He finally asked and Hiruma's silence was his answer.

Wait, I was missing something again, can't tell what? Well, at least Agon didn't think Hiruma was telling the truth, but it didn't stop my face from blushing, only Hiruma could say anything so, well, embarrassing. Other than me of course, I usually said some embarrassing stuff.

"He seems to be infective against me, trust me it's rather frustrating." Hiruma retorted, a sliver of real annoyance and I almost whispered out 'sorry' even though I didn't even know what was wrong.

"Well that's perfect, I want to talk to him tomorrow you haven't…" He let his voice travel off and I swallowed nervously. I didn't like the idea of having to talk to Agon he made it sound like 'alone' fitted in the sentence.

Frightening, after all he didn't seem to have any troubles with 'just cutting' me as he called it. Glup.

Anyway he was scary.

"No way in hell," I leaned against the door inwardly sighing in relief, whatever his reasons Hiruma was not going to put me in that position. "He doesn't even have the slightest idea; we've neglected to mention it, among other things."

Wait, what? There was more I didn't know about? Okay, that didn't really surprise me; it did however explain why no one could give me a straight answer.

"That's not what's important, I've seen how attached his is to that…Jyuumonji brat. It's only a matter of time until the kid's going to spill." He swallowed before saying Jyuumonji's name, as if it was physically painful to do so.

Hiruma made a noise of amusement before continuing, "Riku Kaitani has confirmed that the shrimp wouldn't. He knew the fucking shrimp from before, and is willing to testify on the kid's behave."

I mentally thanked Riku, it was kind of alarming but at least I knew that Riku really did trust me for whatever reason. Agon grunted and I could hear his footsteps lead away from the door.

"So what? Still human. How did he react when you tried to turn him? 'Oh I'm going to be a vampire, that's fantastic'?" Hiruma didn't respond and I thought back sheepishly, hadn't I sort of begged him not to? Urg, a memory I could live without.

"That's what I thought, anyway how long do you plan on only keeping him on a need-to-know basic? Apollo is going to have a fucking cow when he learns that there's a human walking around with knowledge."

I could almost hear the smirk in Agon's voice I really wasn't sure what he had against Apollo.

"Yeah, well, I'll worry about it when the time comes. Now get your ass out of here, I've got better things to do." Hiruma growled and I panicked, rushing as quietly as possible back to my room across the hall.

My door opened at the same time that Hiruma's did and I thanked whoever turned the hall lights off. But then again it wouldn't have surprised me if Agon had super vision.

"Oi, fucking dreads," Hiruma crackled giving me the needed time to charge into my dorm room without being noticed.

"You do know that I was joking about the shrimp dreaming?" I blushed, thankful that Hiruma felt the need to confirm that.

"Shut up."

--

I couldn't sleep. After learning that Agon had some mysterious roll in the whole vampire thing, thoughts kept buzzing around in my head. It wasn't until around midnight I came to a conclusion.

I was going to ask Hiruma.

It was well over time that I just assumed the facts. After all Agon was sort of right, how long would I mentally last living on day-to-day basics only?

Since I couldn't do much of anything until I had my bag, the next day I decided to head to Hiruma's room first thing. I was of course worried what would happen if Hiruma refused. I could just threaten to go to Apollo, but I wasn't sure where that would lead.

"Monta, I have to leave early, don't wait up for me." I muttered bolting out of the room as soon as his alarm went off. I left just in time to hear him say "what, wha?" and seconds later I was pounding on Hiruma's door.

"You," He greeted and I slipped back him into the room my heart beating in my ears. "Hiruma-san," I said nervously, I hadn't planned to speak in Japanese but it wasn't like he couldn't understand.

Nervously I paced from the couch and back my brain stuck.

"Is there a reason I'm awarded with your presence?" Hiruma asked dryly and I nodded. "G-g-give me a moment," I hadn't meant to stutter, while planning I had forgotten that I would be in a sound-proof room, alone with Hiruma.

Which, I believed to be a very good reason to be nervous.

"I think I've done a good job so far by listening to everything you've told me to do, you know? Well other than leaving last weekend, but, um, sorry about that," I paused for breath, luckily Hiruma didn't snap some witty comment and I continued in a braver voice.

"Yeah, so, um, I don't think it would be too much, maybe, but I have some questions. And um, I would really like if I could get, to, um, ask, er, s-s-some questions, please."

"Okay."

I blinked, had I just heard him wrong? "O-okay?" I parroted and he nodded. "Sure, whatever, but if you also want answers then you've got to do something for me." I swallowed nervously, I should have expected him to try and make a bargain.

"W-what?" He looked around carefully before turning to me and smiling, "follow me."