Saya swung one of her legs in a sweep, and knocked over the man who had stabbed her. Yui shuddered in violent relief. Yes, Saya had said she wasn't easily killed, but being told that decapitation was only an issue of time and seeing her stabbed in the heart were two different things, nonetheless.

Slowly, Saya climbed to her feet, and then looked down at her chest, where the sword was protruding. With a careless tug, she pulled it out, ignoring the blood and the wound and letting it clatter to the ground.

"What the hell kind of freak are you?" said the one with the eyepatch, baring his teeth.

"Shin," barked Carla, "silence."

He was apprehensive, eyes on Saya even as he too regained his footing. Afraid, and almost like . . . he had realized something?

As if reminded of their presence, Saya slowly raised her head from the blade on the ground towards them. Yui couldn't see her face from where she was, but judging from the way Shin flinched, Saya very likely had changed her eyes to their red state.

And then she disappeared.

Shin yelled in pain, and Yui had to look in his direction because Saya had done that thing again where she moved, so fast to the point where she had appeared to have disappeared simply because Yui couldn't keep track of her movement.

With a crack that came from bone breaking, Saya twisted his body in a way bodies really shouldn't be twisted, bending him down to kick him. The dull percussion of skin almost exploding from the hit wasn't masked by Shin's choked-off scream of pain or Carla's furious shout.

But Saya heard, sharp as her senses were, and she turned towards Carla, and Yui finally saw her face. Her eyes were red, yes, and her face splattered with blood, either her own or someone else's. All the fighting and movement meant her hair, usually glossy and under control, looked wild and tangled and dirty.

She was still devastatingly beautiful, but this was the wild, dangerous side that Saya usually kept hidden, out in the open like a predator with nothing to fear.

"You smell weird," she told Carla, and Yui didn't miss the oddness of that statement – just how out of character she seemed, almost dreamy – before Saya leaned down to bite Shin's neck and begin drinking.

Carla grabbed the sword and lunged towards her, forcing Saya to stop her feeding and bat him away with Shin's bruised, possibly broken body.

That, however, was what Carla apparently wanted. A snap of his fingers with one hand while the other retrieved Shin made fire erupt all around. Saya looked unbothered, but it earned him a second of time while she blinked –

To escape.

Carla ran out of the manor, Shin in tow. He even grabbed and tossed Kanato, who happened to be in the way, onto the ground, making the purple-haired vampire scream in protest.

"What the fuck?" said Ayato, when they were out of sight.

"Did that fucker just leave?" Subaru said, incredulously. "After all that?"

"Ignoble, but a strategic retreat," Reiji commented, digging out a pair of glasses from his pocket and putting it on, looking more like his usual self.

Yui could understand how the brothers felt, minus the cursing. It felt anticlimactic, almost. Even Saya had stopped, staring at the direction of their exit with a blank gaze.

"Oi," said Subaru, glancing at Saya. "You okay?"

He was concerned, in his own way. And so was Yui, because Saya, for all that she had been winning, had still been stabbed in the heart.

At his words, Saya turned her attention towards them. Maybe it was the eyes, with their vertical slit for pupils, but the way Saya tipped her head slightly as she gazed upon them all reminded Yui of a cat. The others seemed more wary of her, though.

As if trying to shake it off, Ruki sighed loudly while the blond vampire at his side continued to eye Saya warily.

"Lady Saya," he said. "We're glad you're safe."

Azusa tugged off his jacket, and held it up in offering as he walked closer to Saya. "It's not . . . much . . . but your clothes . . ."

Were ragged, bloody and if it weren't for the red covering her and plastering the cloth to her body, there would be a lot showing, Yui realized, as Saya began reaching towards Azusa. That was nice of him to -

"Azusa, get back!" screamed the blond suddenly, startling Yui and everyone. He was one she hadn't met before, but his eyes – or at least the blue one visible and not covered by his hair – was wide with terror.

"Ah – ah!"

Yui turned back to Saya, who had, in that short time, grabbed Azusa and was now drinking from him. The scarred vampire trembled in her grip while she fed, looking just as alarmed as they felt.

"Azusa!" shouted Ruki. "Lady Saya, what-?!"

"That's not her!" the blond snapped back, while Yuma roared in fury and leapt forwards, arms outstretched towards Saya, or maybe his brother.

Saya reacted in a way similar to how she had with Carla and Shin. That is to say, she swung Azusa like a blunt weapon, using his arm as leverage, and smashed him into his brother. Yui cringed when both of them crashed into the ground, Azusa's arm bent in a way and angle that said it was definitely broken.

Not that Saya seemed to care. She looked at them with eyes that held no worth or value regarding what she saw, and then up, to glance at all the other vampires in the room. The weight of her red gaze made them all tense.

It wasn't annoyance on her face. Just impatience, and maybe anticipation. But there was no recognition, that was for sure.

It wasn't until Saya had jumped, closing the distance between them in a quick second to snatch the closest vampire to her – Reiji – by the front of his shirt and sink her teeth into his throat, that Yui realized there was also hunger in her eyes. That had been unfamiliar because Saya and hunger had never really seemed to fit, or at the very least, she hadn't seen it with Saya to match it immediately.

"We need to leave!" shouted the blond, pulling at Ruki's arm. "Get Azusa, Yuma!"

"Yui, get back," snapped Shu at the same time. She started at her name, but Shu, unlike the others that had leapt to their brother's defense, moved until he was behind Saya before attacking.

He was rewarded with a partial success, in that he did land a hit. Saya snarled when he struck her, and Reiji took that change to punch her in the face and break free.

For that, Shu was kicked in the head, and Reiji in the stomach. They both stumbled and fell back at the blows they received, Reiji retching up blood and Shu crumpling where he fell, not rising again.

This all happened in less than a minute. Maybe ten seconds. Maybe a little more, though not by much. Yui's brain struggled to keep up, and only managed to process that something was wrong with Saya and they stood no chance against her.

Her eyes, bright red even now, followed movement, and unfortunately it was the Mukami. More specifically, Yuma picking up Azusa.

Ruki saw, and threw himself forwards to intercept Saya. He body-slammed her, and while it didn't throw Saya back, it did make her pause.

Yuma threw Azusa to the blond and didn't look back to see if he caught the wounded vampire. Instead, he ran to Ruki's aid, and got Saya in a hold that restrained her upper body and arms before raising her up so that her feet couldn't reach the ground.

"Shit, I can't believe that worked," he panted out, right before Saya swung her legs up to bend them before lashing them out in a vicious horizontal kick to the chin that sent Ruki stumbling back.

Then, she slammed her head back, smashing Yuma's face with the back of her own skull. He released her, and she was free to turn and punch him down.

Swearing, Ayato began to step forwards, but Laito grabbed his shoulder with the hand that wasn't already holding Subaru back.

"You idiots," he hissed, usual smile completely missing from his face. "She's attacking those that come close."

Yui started at his observation. Yuma and Ruki were both on the ground, Ruki trying to climb back up while Yuma seemed to be out. Reiji, a little further off, had lost his glasses once more, and Shu was still. Vampires didn't need to breathe to live, so Yui could only hope he hadn't died. Azusa and the blond were shaking, eyes concerned for their brothers.

But Kanato, who was sitting on the ground from when Carla had thrown him during his escape, and Subaru, and Laito and Ayato hadn't been attacked. They hadn't been close to her, and they also hadn't tried to attack or move. This was instinct moving her, dealing with whatever bothered her feeding. Like a wild animal on the hunt.

Saya also took that time to look at the scene she had made. Yui's breath caught when her eyes landed on her, but Saya only blinked before moving on.

Too weak to be a threat? Or –

The promise Saya had made floated up in the surface of her mind. Trembling, she took a step forwards.

"Oi, Pancake, are you insane?" said Ayato, before he grunted at Laito jabbing him in the side with his elbow.

She probably was. But so was her life, so what was new at this point. What was one more flicker of insanity in this bonfire of madness.

The movement caught Saya's eyes – nothing could escape the ruby red eyes that caught everything, even when Saya moved in her inhuman speed – but Saya didn't react the violent way she had with the vampires. Maybe it was because she couldn't be a threat, but to be fair, the vampires also hadn't been a threat to Saya. Neither had the First Bloods, who had been stronger than the Sakamaki brothers combined.

Yui held onto that.

Saya picked up Ruki, and began to feed from him. He resisted, but he might as well not have done anything. Saya ignored everything and continued to drink messily, blood dripping down the lower half of her face and neck.

It was such a stark difference from how carefully Saya sipped at her coffee at school, during lunchtime. And maybe that was why Yui was taking this gamble, based on nothing but faith and a promise that could have just been words. Because this wasn't Saya, and while she wasn't arrogant enough to say she could just force Saya to change back to how she had been, maybe, just maybe, she could remind Saya.

She took another step. And another, and another, until she was close enough to reach out and touch Saya.

Which was exactly what she did, by laying a hand against Saya's forearm. Ruki, in her grip, looked at Yui like she was insane, and maybe she was.

"Saya-san," she said.

Saya paused in her frenzy. She paused, Yui knew, because that almost childish focus faded from her eyes.

I don't feed from humans, she had promised Yui once, and Yui knew that wasn't a lie then, but she felt it more than anything in this moment as the predator that was so focused on feeding stopped that frenzy to look at her, really look at her when everyone else was deemed nothing as prey.

Yui was grateful for that focus, but at the same time it was heavy.

After a long moment, Saya tossed Ruki to the side and reached for her head, in the same casual motion she used to reach for Azusa, and it took so much for Yui to stand still and not flinch. She wasn't even sure if she had succeeded, but she had to trust Saya right now.

The trust and the desperate fight to keep her instincts clamped down paid off. Saya patted her head, clumsily. Not even a trace of the violence she had shown towards the vampires was present, only awkward gentleness, as if she was unfamiliar and unsure of how much force could be used safely and was being very careful.

"Let me go, Eve," she said softly, and the fear was back, only rather than being the primitive, instinctive fear for her life, it was a despair that even Saya was calling her Eve. "I'm tired, and hungry."

"Saya-san," she choked out, sobs trying to strangle her throat.

"Saya?" repeated Saya, and Yui realized that this person wasn't Saya, not quite. She didn't know how or why, and it didn't matter right now because she needed Saya here, not this stranger in her skin.

"Saya-san," she repeated. "Please."

Please stop. Please come back. Please don't scare me. Please don't hurt me don't kill me don't hate me don't look at me like you don't recognize me don't don't don't please please please.

The person who wasn't quite Saya blinked, and then sighed softly, almost sadly. The childish light was gone now, replaced with a weariness that could have been Saya's, if Saya did not hold it back behind her iron-clad stoicism.

"Let me go, Eve."

Yui could only see the side profile of Saya's face, but she could still see the blood on her lips, the glowing red of her eyes, and the exhaustion that lined her beautiful features.

Past all that, she still looked like Saya, as she usually was.

But Yui held tight.

"I'm not Eve," she said, and she was sobbing. Tears were running down her face uncontrollably, and it was hard to speak the words through the sobs but she had to push them out, past the bawls that wanted to take priority. "I'm Yui. Komori Yui, remember? You promised, Saya-san. To-to call me Yui."

It was not explicit, but implied nonetheless. That no matter what Saya would see Yui as Komori Yui, not as Eve or Cordelia or whatever else she might be associated with. A promise made with her actions and words, as consistent as they always had been while Yui's life was plunged into the fearful chaos since that night.

There were other promises that Saya had given – that she would not drink Yui's blood, that she would tell her only the truth when she spoke, that she would make sure Yui lived, but for some reason, that was the promise Yui spoke of as she clung to Saya like a drowning man. A promise because Saya could not lie, she had said so.

It might not be important, but it was to Yui. She didn't want to be seen as Eve by Saya. Not by her, not when she had been the first source of stability that she clung to in the chaos. Not when everything that she had known as Komori Yui seemed to have dissolved like tissue under a rainstorm and all she had left was that name to claim as herself.

And it was Saya who had made this promise, and so she appealed to Saya. Not whoever was here right now, but the Saya who told her she could call her by that name, the Saya that listened to Yui.

"Ah."

It was a single sound, but as if it were a key unlocking something, Saya slumped. Yui saw the red fade into dark grey before her eyelids closed, and then gasped when Saya fell unconscious, forcing Yui to struggle to keep her upright. Saya wasn't heavy, exactly, but Yui was not the strongest person around and it was so sudden she hadn't expected it.

"Shit."

A hand reached to support Saya, and Yui could let go of Saya while Subaru picked Saya up in his arms.

"I can't believe that worked," he said, looking down warily at Saya, who didn't wake up because a vampire was touching her. Maybe she was tired too.

Subaru had taken Saya's weight, but now that the adrenaline and faith were unneeded, she was left without any strength, not even enough to stand back on her own feet.

Yui exhaled, and the sound was rough, terribly so, like every part of her body was strained and wanted to refuse to work. "Me too."

TL;DR

Lilith: I'm hungry but new food keeps trying to bother me please wait your turn I'm hungry enough to eat from all of you. What is this 'don't waste food' you speak of? I've never heard of such a thing in my life.

Yui: Saya-san you promised!

Saya (tired, asleep inside, trying to shut out the flashback): *puts down Lilith, but is too tired to stay awake and goes back to sleep*

.

If Yui decided she was going to pretend to be Eve to go along with 'Saya's' delusions, that would have been a Bad End, because Lilith would have officially taken over while Saya decided to just give up. But this is a story with a happy ending so.