LOOKY LOOKY! I have FANART!!! YAYAY!! *chibi DragonSeer hops up and down and waves a flag* PLEASE PLEASE check it out and I'd be happy to get more fanart! I'll put it up! Really! I will! If you'd like to check it out, look in my bio, which I'm updating as we speak. It's cool!

Rose leaned back and sighed deeply. Sooo bored!! She was sitting on the plane without anything to do, and the trip to England was a long twelve-hour flight. She glanced around, looking for an escape from her boredom. Her things were all in the cargo bay, as was a large sarcophagus which she knew housed Kain's sleeping form. Desperate to move, she stood and walked toward the bathroom, though she really didn't need to make use of it. She slid in and locked the door behind her, then leaned her forehead against the mirror and sighed deeply.

"Bored?" a familiar voice asked from behind her just as she felt a tall male form press up against hers. She didn't need to turn to recognize Kain, nor could she have if she had wanted to. The added bulk of the master vampire to her frame made it nearly impossible to move.

"Very," she answered, relieved to hear his voice. She felt the energy of his teleportation spell swirl around their bodies, and she found herself safely tucked in his sarcophagus and pressed up against Kain.

"Better?"

"Much," she responded, and turned toward him. She kissed him lightly, then snuggled under his chin. She felt the very slow but steady pulse run through his throat as he chuckled softly.

"Mum! Dad!" Rose dropped the bag she was carrying and hugged her parents, finding herself surprisingly happy to be home. The climate of England wrapped around her and she sighed, feeling old memories stir in the back of her mind.

"So, how is America?" Lara inquired, a smile on her face.

"It's good, but it's certainly not England."

"And did you buy clothes until your heart was content?" Raziel demanded.

"No," she responded. "I actually didn't buy that much in the ways of clothes while I was there. I didn't really need it. American fashion is just about everything, it seems."

The three walked toward the car, reminiscing on her trials and tribulations through the United States. Kain walked slightly behind them, watching Rose. His relationship with her certainly hadn't gone the way he had expected it to. Oh, he always knew that she'd sleep with him; that he had known since they had discovered she would be the first vampire who could breed. Even if she hadn't already been interested in him, he would have made her be. That should have been one of the tip-offs, though, the fact that she was so fascinated by him, so interested in being at his side. If he had been forced to manipulate the relationship, he wouldn't care about continuing to manipulate it. But Rose had done everything by her own free will, and that was something he was not accustomed to. Raziel had told her enough of his tales that she would know that Kain would inevitably manipulate her, and yet she still walked down this road fearlessly. And that was one of the worst things she could do.

Ah, who was he kidding? Lying to other people was one thing, but not to himself. It was the worst choice only for him, and he knew it. He loved his little Rose, the child he had watched grow, the child who could save his world. But he was beginning to wonder if he just might love the woman whom his 'little' Rose was growing into . . .

A few days passed as Rose settled back into her home for the duration of the week. The relative atmosphere of the mansion was a happy one, though Raziel and Kain clashed personas every so often. As promised, Kain and Rose stayed as far away from each other as they always had, and acted as though nothing had ever happened between them. Rose still threw a ball at his head every so often, just to get the annoyed reaction she expected.

"Mum," Rose stated on the morning of the third day, "I think I'd like to do a little shopping, if we can. There are some things you just cannot get in America."

"All right, Rose. We can go today, it you'd like."

Raziel, who had just walked in, groaned slightly to himself. This was going to mean that inevitably he and Kain would get dragged along. Kain, who had also come in at the wrong time, shared a look with his first born, and both nodded silently, then turned toward their respective doors, and walked back out of the room again to go hide from the crazy females. Lara's eyes narrowed at this.

"Go find your father, I'll go get Kain."

"Right-o."

Her mother gave her an odd look before heading after the master vampire. Rose turned to go find her father.

After a few minutes of rounding up the respective males, the four headed out toward the mall that Rose had been used to visiting a year ago. They headed into the three-story mall and Rose sighed, having forgotten what the place was like. Pulled in different directions by their separate interests, the four moved apart and went where they wanted. Rose wandered aimlessly for a while until she felt a light tap at her shoulder. She turned to see one of the mall cops looking around nervously a moment, then grinned what was supposed to be a winning grin at her. Rose swore mentally and sighed aloud; it was Hubert.

"Well, hello," he greeted her. She glared at him.

"You don't remember me, do you?"

He blinked curiously at her. "I would think I would remember someone as beautiful as you, so no, I don't believe we have."

"I must have hit you rather hard with that hotdog stand then," another male voice growled lowly. Hubert turned and his face drained of color as his gaze met the golden one of Kain. He stepped back a few paces to get away from the vampire, and bumped into someone. He spun and grabbed onto the man's shirt.

"You have to help me! That man's going to kill me!"

"There, there," he responded, and his skin shifted from tan to blue. "He'll only kill you if I don't get to you first."

The cop screamed and raced as fast as he could away, and Rose was doing her best not to laugh. Lara walked up calmly to them and let an arm sneak around the now human-looking Soul Reaver.

"That wasn't nice," Rose told them.

"We're not nice," Raziel answered with a slight shrug. Rose sighed and shook her head.

"I think I've had enough shopping now," the crossbreed stated bluntly. After such a joyous little interaction with the human, no one was really in the mood to complain. The ride back to the mansion was quiet, as Rose staring out the window, Kain was in contemplation of the things that had changed on Nosgoth and the things he had to do when he returned, Raziel pondered how to get said master vampire out of his family's life, and Lara was left shaking her head, intuitively guessing what was going on in her husband's mind. After finally getting to the mansion, Kain teleported somewhere, Lara decided to go back into the training room, and Rose headed up to her room. She looked up as she headed in to find Kain standing across the room.

"What's up?" she inquired.

"I came to have some along time with you," he answered and walked toward her. She grinned impishly and shook her head as he leaned down to kiss her, then she stepped away.

"We can't do this, you know."

"Oh, I know." He caught her and pulled her against him, his claws slipping up under the back of her shirt and scratching the skin gently. She stretched under the back scratch, but tried to stay immune to him. She knew it was a loosing battle; after all, it was a wonderful back scratch. She felt herself lean up against him, and he kissed her again before moving her and leaning her back across the bed.

Suddenly, there was an "Ahem" from the doorway. Both looked up to see Raziel standing with his arms crossed, glaring down at the two. Kain hastily stood, pulling Rose up with him.

"Dad, I can explain."

"I'm sure you can, Rose," her father responded. "But that's not going to save him." The Reaver didn't unfurl into life; rather, it was inexplicably there when it hadn't before. The Soul Reaver's eyes had begun to glow white. Kain, knowing with full surety that he could easily take on Raziel, began charging up. He paused, realizing that his power would probably level half the mansion. With that in mind, Kain did the thing anyone would expect of him: he kept charging up. Then his eyes fell on Rose, and while he didn't care about the mansion, he realized Rose would probably be badly hurt. So he did the next best thing; he teleported to a place outside where they could fight and no one would be hurt. Raziel lunged out the window after the master vampire, and Rose quickly raced out of her room to find her mother. Lara glanced up at her daughter's panicked face and immediately pulled out the MP5 and headed out toward the front yard of the mansion.

Raziel and Kain were in the front of the mansion engaged in a huge battle that was quickly tearing up the landscape.

"What is your father so angry about?" Lara inquired, watching Raziel attacked single-mindedly the master vampire.

"Ah, he, uh, walked into my room while Kain was in there, and, heh . . ."

"You two were kissing, weren't you?" her mother sighed. Rose looked up at Lara quickly.

"You knew?"

"Of course. I noticed it right before you left to go to college. I had been hoping your father wouldn't find out for a much longer time. Oh well. I hoped in vain, it seems. Let's go stop your father from killing Kain, shall we?"

"And how are we going to do that?"

Lara calmly walked out to the battlefield and waited until the two broke apart long enough for her to walk over to Raziel. She grabbed his arm and he spun toward her, eyes demanding why she interceded. She ignored the question, stepped up to him, and kissed him, pulling him against her so he couldn't move away. He twisted his head and tried to pull away. He wasn't about to be distracted by her.

"No sex," Lara stated firmly. Raziel stopped and turned toward her, blinking in surprise.

" . . . Was that a threat?"

"No, it's the consequence of your actions should you continue this pointless battle."

Raziel's eyes narrowed. "You wouldn't dare."

"Love, you should know me well enough now to know that I never bluff."

He let out an aggravated sound. Lara smiled, knowing she had won, then turned on Kain. The master vampire's eyes widened, then five minutes and much cursing later, he was tied to a chair in the main hall with a piece of tape over his mouth so he couldn't infuriate Raziel with a verbal jab. Raziel sat at the head of the table and looked at Rose for a long moment.

"So, how long has this been going on?"

Rose hesitated. "A few months."

"Rose," Raziel sighed. "I have told you enough about him that you should know better than to trust him."

"I know, Dad."

He was silent a moment. "Do you love him?"

Rose looked up in surprise and met her father's carefully neutral gaze.

"What?"

"Do you love him?" Raziel stood and walked toward her. She naturally looked away from her father's probing eyes, but he put a claw under her chin and forced her to look up at him. Rose hesitated and glanced at Kain. He watched her with a serious expression, having forgotten for the moment he was bound. She looked back up at her father.

"For good or for ill . . . I think I do."

Raziel turned away from her for a moment and gazed into the open silently. Then he smirked, walked over to Kain, and pulled the tape off Kain's mouth. He leaned down and cut the bonds with his claws. His smirk widened to a malevolent smile as Kain eyed him worriedly.

"Well, she loves you, so that gives you a free pass out of this beating. And, besides, I know if you hurt her, she'll allow me to kill you."

Happy he'd inevitably get his revenge, Raziel walked out of the room to go join Lara in the training hall. Rose looked up at Kain as he walked slowly toward her.

"Would you send Raziel after me if I did hurt you?"

Rose hesitated as she thought. They were on dangerous territory, as Rose didn't want to be hurt, but she knew that Kain would never be comfortable in a relationship with her if she held any sort of obvious threat over him. Any way of revenge for her would have to be subtler than that. And it came down to the fact that she loved him too much that, no matter how deeply he hurt her, she would never sic Raziel on Kain.

"No, I wouldn't."

Kain leaned down and kissed her passionately. She snuggled up against him and sighed. He kissed her gently on the ear and murmured into her ear, "My little Rose."

"My master vampire."

"I'm not yours. You are mine."

"Hey. If I'm yours, then you're mine."

"Nope. Doesn't work that way, Rose."

"Grr."