Author's Note: Well wowee… This took a long time. But it's spring break! So gimme a break people, it's 4:00 in the morning and I just got inspiration! Mwa! Why no song? I actually was listening to an instrumental, sorry to break the lovely pattern...


Metal… It was always the sound of metal. Like swords, one on the other, over, and over, and over again in a dance of death and true, honorable beauty. A bout of strength, agility, honor, and pride, all rolled into one perfect package, a duel.

It was always there in his dreams, the sound, the reflection of light off the polished steel.

Was it his destiny, his future?

Blood… Everywhere. Staining his sight, filling his lungs and drowning him in a sea of hatred and sadness.

Metal on metal, sparks, noise, then…

"Suzuka!"

Zechs opened his eyes, ice-blue orbs seeming to take on their own glow within the dark confines of his room. The moon was shadowed by the clouds, as rain pelted the window outside, and thunder rolled overhead. He tried to check his clock, but the time wasn't showing. His lamp wasn't working.

"The power must have gone out…" Zechs said to himself.

--

Ring.

A simple noise that caused him to practically jump from the bed. He was sitting in perfect silence, until that sound reached his ears, harsh and shrill. He turned his head to the right, as he fumbled on the nightstand for his cellular phone; flipping it open when he found it.

Without so much as a hello, he put the cold receiver to his ear.

"Why, if it isn't Mr. Morningshine. How are you doing? Well, I hope. So glad you were awake, I was beginning to wonder if you had died… Of course, it would take more than a few bullets to kill you, wouldn't it?"

Zechs narrowed his eyes, as his grip on the phone tightened some. He knew the voice, cold, arrogant, and cruel.

"With not even so much as a hello, why isn't that quite rude."

"What do you want," came Zechs' controlled reply.

"Ah, well, I'd wonder if I could interest you in a trade, perhaps?"

"No." Zechs was about to flip the phone off, when Treize's voice came louder.

"But I have something that I just know you want."

"You have nothing I want."

"Oh, but I do. Next to me here is quite the lady, I've had to resist taking her thus far. Tempting, though. I wonder if she's a virgin?"

Zechs' eyes immediately went from anger to shock mixed with deep, unbidden rage.

"And her name, as I believe, is Suzuka."









Author's Note: Waaiii. Short, I know. But hey. It's crappy, but hey. I just couldn't spit this chapter out, so 12 will be much better. I promise.