This chapter is ridiculously short, I know, but anything else I tried to add or any filler I tried to do just would not work, which is why this is all there is. I tried, but I just couldn't do it. In other news, I have the Fifteenth Night in the works already, if that's any comfort.
Thanks for being patient with me, I hope you continue to be so. I'm pretty burned out lately, and getting up the want to write is hard. I'm doing my best, though.
I'm not in the best place right now, so Yuuki's characterization might be off in places. She's meant to be gaining some personality traits carried over from her past life, which makes them my personality traits, so I did my best to incorporate them realistically, but please let me know if it comes off as clunky or bad or whatever, and I can go through to try and fix them.
"Yoriii," Yuuki whined, draped over Yori's shoulders as her best friend packs her suitcase for break. "Don't leave meee," she complains, pressing her nose and lips against Yori's shoulder, which is bared by the tank top she's wearing.
"The next break isn't for months, Yuuki, and my dad is looking forward to seeing me. It's last minute, but I want to go see him. I'll be back in a week," Yori reaches up to pat Yuuki's head, and she pouts.
The break really was spontaneous. Yuuki, herself, isn't really 100% sure why they're getting a break except that over half of the Night Class is going to be going off campus, as well as their teachers. Cross had said something about "fairness", but she didn't really get the point and whenever she'd tried to ask, he'd avoided answering her.
Which wasn't all that surprising, what with her lost faith in the man, but still stung regardless.
"Yeah, yeah," Yuuki mumbles sulkily. Yori huffs a little and wiggles a shoulder, jarring Yuuki's head off her shoulder before turning around, wrapping her arms around Yuuki's shoulders in a tight hug that lasts a while, Yuuki lifting her arms and wrapping them around her friend in return, feeling better for the contact.
"Yuuki," Yori's voice is serious, though not angry. "I need to finish packing, and you're being very unhelpful. Please stop getting in my way."
"... Alright," Yuuki nods against Yori's head, and when she's released she backs up to sit on her long unused dormitory bed, pulling her legs up to press against her torso and resting her head on her knees, watching Yori turn back to her packing.
"Do you want to explain what's been going on this last week?" Yori questions idly, folding a sweater up and placing it in the case. Yuuki purses her lips and looks away, turning her attention to the dorm room wall.
She's been avoiding Zero, sleeping in the dorm, getting clingy with her best friend at any opportunity as her tiredness mounts from nightmares constantly interrupting her sleep. Thankfully she's not yet had any problems with bloodlust or sunlight sensitivity, though her senses are sharpening up. In times when she wasn't able to do bother Yori, she'd taken to trying to work out, getting a new feel for her body- it'd been difficult in class, but Zero'd been skipping classes lately and she'd just taken to trying to take as many comprehensive notes as she possibly could. The teachers had been suspicious, but kept their silence.
Zero'd been avoiding her too, to be fair, but neither of them were being very discreet and people had noticed. Yori among them.
"Not… Really," Yuuki admits after awhile. "Not that I can cover in the next couple of minutes while you pack, at least," she shakes her head as Yori glances over. "I want to tell you, but it's a long story, and I don't know how to explain it right now. Plus, I don't want the chance of anyone overhearing us talk."
Talking to Yori might actually be the best thing she can do. She's hardly been spending much time with her best friend lately, and she should rectify that. Explaining an edited version of what's going on in her life could be helpful to the both of them.
But that would have to wait until she's actually able to verbalize what's going on.
"It's just hard, right now," Yuuki murmurs reluctantly.
"I hope you'll make up with Zero soon, Yuuki," Yori offered after awhile of silence. "You're stretching yourself pretty thin without him."
"... Me too," she mumbled, pulling her knees a little closer to herself before pushing them away and standing up as Yori finishes packing, zipping her suitcase closed. Reaching over, Yuuki snatches her best friend's suitcase and duffel bag from her grasp, slinging the bag over one shoulder. "I'll walk you to the gates, alright?"
"I can carry my own things," Yori comments, though she doesn't try to take them from Yuuki as they walk out of the room.
"Yeah, but I want an excuse to walk with you," Yuuki shrugs.
"You don't need an excuse," her friend protests sincerely, and Yuuki doesn't look over at her despite that she can feel Yori's eyes on the side of her face.
"Do you have any plans with your dad over break?" Yuuki asks after a minute, changing the subject.
Yori allows it without comment. "I don't know, he didn't mention anything specific. Are you going to say hi to him?"
"If he's there when we get there, sure," Yuuki offers like she's not apprehensive about meeting her best friend's dad. She hasn't done so before- hasn't ever met any parents other than Ichijou Asato, which had been unpleasant, and her own "father", as well as her own parents, but those last three didn't count.
"Are you going to wait at the gate with me if he isn't?"
"If I can, I don't have any problem with it. But if people start getting rowdy, I might have to leave. And I'm supposed to supervise some things with the male Sun Dorms at around noon, so I won't be able to stay very long, either way."
"The boy's dorms? Isn't that Zero's job?"
"Usually, but he didn't show up to the meeting about it, so I'm going to go there anyway, just in case. The girl's dorms aren't going to get anything done until around noon, so I've technically got time to do both."
Mostly, she's going to have to supervise janitors. The dorms get skim-cleaned every weekend, and normally the students can keep spaces clean, but since there's going to be a week-long break, Cross is using the opportunity to get some deep cleans done. Especially in the bathrooms and common areas.
"How tiring," Yori murmurs in acceptance, walking a little faster to walk next to Yuuki rather than slightly behind and to the side like she'd been before.
Shifting in place as she watches the janitors leave the area, Yuuki shifts her eyes to look back towards the dorms, having the feeling of being watched. Some part of her suggests that it's Zero, but she dismissed that to hope and turns her attention to the side instead as she hears someone call her.
"Cross-san, why are you still over here?"
"Ah, dorm leader?" Yuuki asks, turning her attention to the side to spot the girl approaching, the girl holding a clipboard close to her chest and dressed casually, rather than in her uniform, which is just a little strange to see.
"Ah, I was watching the cleaners leave," she answers, tucking her hands into the pockets of her jacket.
"Alright…" She responds, her expression twisting just a little before she turns her attention to the clipboard in her hands. "I just came to see if you're going to be supervising the cleaners for our dorm, as well? Wakaba-san mentioned to me at the gate that you were going to be here."
"Yeah, I'm going to try and head over there in a bit," she explains, "I was just waiting to see if Zero would be coming out to help…"
"I see. Well, I have to tell you that you shouldn't just lurk outside of the boy's dormitory," she tells Yuuki after a pause. "It's not really allowed in the rules, and as a prefect, you should be setting an example to the rest of us."
"I understand," Yuuki nods. "I wasn't going to stay very long, but I understand."
"Sorry to interrupt," an uncomfortably familiar voice calls for their attention, and Yuuki swings her head around to see the familiar form of Aidou approaching from the left, dressed in jeans and a dark blue hoodie, looking very tired and also kind of irritated. "Could I talk to you for a second?"
"Idol-senpai!" The dorm leader's voice almost drowns out what he says next.
"I can't find the Chairman. Is he out somewhere?" Yuuki blinks in confusion.
"Did you check the main faculty office?"
"He wasn't there." Yuuki furrows her brows as the dorm leader continues talking, stepping forward towards Aidou as Yuuki thinks to herself, trying to think of where Cross might have gone.
"Why are you here? It's not easy for Day and Night classes to come and go as they please, right? Especially-"
"I'm sorry," Aidou answers in a light tone, lifting a hand up to press a finger against his lips. "I'm running away from the dorms right now. You didn't see me, alright?" Running away? Yuuki frowns in confusion and watches as the dorm president falls to his charms.
"Of course I won't, I understand. I'll just leave it to the prefect!" The dorm president walks off, and Yuuki stares after her for awhile before turning her attention to Aidou, who takes a few steps in her direction before lifting a hand up to rub at the back of his neck.
"I was going to the chairman to ask about some things, but he's not here. And so, I ran away from the dorm. Basically." Yuuki hears a distant shout and looks up in time to watch a window open and watch Zero jump out of a third story window, landing on the ground in a crouch and then walking closer. Something about him makes Yuuki shift in unease, and she watches him and Aidou both carefully.
"Aidou-senpai… Students of the Night Class aren't supposed to be in the Day Class area, and you knew that already," he says in a blandly serious voice.
"Zero's right, Aidou. You should go back to the dorms. They'll be mostly empty now, anyway, and I'm sure the Headmaster will be back sometime."
"To the dorm? I don't want to," Aidou refuses coldly, looking to the side away from she and Zero both, looking thoughtful before his face pinches into something bratty. "And I absolutely won't!"
"Yuuki, if you can find a rope, we can tie him up and drag him back," Zero comments from the side, walking closer to her. Aidou twitches like he's been electrocuted before taking off at a run, and Yuuki frowns in irritation.
"Ah. He's running away," she mentions, Zero already turning on heel and running after him, both of them going as fast as possible and getting quite a distance before Yuuki comes to her senses and chases after them as well, ignoring the strange looks the action garners her.
Soon enough, they manage to catch Aidou, Zero having to bodily tackle the surprisingly slippery vampire before they manage to do so with any real success. Yuuki wiggles her hands in between he and Zero, seizing onto his wrists and then nodding to Zero to get up, twisting Aidou's arms and pulling on them until he's forced to kneel, and then stand, or else risk wrenching or even breaking one or both of his arms.
"Should we just take him to the dorms now and be done with it?" Yuuki asks Zero, ignoring the immediate, loud protest of her captive as Zero grabs his resisting arms from her. Aidou, smartly, stops trying to wrench them free, because Zero wouldn't hesitate to wrench them to make a point.
"He'd probably escape again," Zero refuses before looking over at Aidou, who's sulking. "Don't make me run for something so stupid again."
"You should have helped me escape the dorm in the first place," he huffs, but Yuuki ignores him, continuing to watch Zero.
"We're going to have to babysit him, huh?" She asks. "Why not go to the house, and keep him there until Cross comes back and sorts him out?"
"I'm hungry…" Aidou whines, then yelps when Zero tightens his hands around his wrists sharply, making him fall silent.
"Seems like we're going to have to," Zero sighs before kicking the back of Aidou's foot. "Let's go."
"Huungry," Aidou complains from on the couch, draped over it like he's a suffering noblewoman. "Make me some food," he demands, then. Yuuki scowls at him, and he sits up, crossing his legs and waving a hand. "Will there be an empty bed in the morning? I want something nice and soft.. If the linens don't smell like lavender, though, I can't sleep… If someone tries to find me, don't tell them I'm here. And, let's see… I need a toothbrush and a towel…"
Yuuki reaches out to grab a hold of Zero, keeping him from striking out at Aidou despite the fact that she really wants to, as well.
"Aidou, is there a reason you're running away from the dorm and acting so difficult?"
"... It's nothing." A foul temper writhes up from the bottom of her stomach and chest, irritation wanting her to lash out, and Yuuki pushes that down. That's irrational and for all that she hates Aidou, for all that she really does not want him to be here, Aidou doesn't really deserve to have Yuuki lashing out with potentially fatal force because she's throwing a temper tantrum.
Yuuki turns on heel, and hears Aidou demanding to be fed some more. Her face twitches beyond her control, and a smile blooms across her face, sickening sweet at she turns to look Aidou dead in the face, her face a picture of innocent, cheerful submission.
"I'll make you something, then."
"Yuuki, no," Zero interrupts as she enters the kitchen, trailing along quickly behind. "You are not allowed to cook."
"Well, if he doesn't get something, then he's just going to get more and more annoying," Yuuki complains, crossing her arms and leaning against the side of the counter. There's a bubbling anger in the pit of her stomach that she doesn't understand, that she won't let loose because that's a wild sort of feeling and she knows that it's dangerous. So she ignores it, and it sits in her stomach, not growing any larger or hotter, seemingly content to just sit there and be ready to explode at the slightest jostling. "And we can't kill him… People saw him with us." She's a little surprised at the words after they're out of her mouth, and she pauses, one hand uncrossing to lift and press her fingertips against her lips and chin.
Where did that come from? She can't remember ever saying something so cynical before.
"Then I'll make something," Zero responds, gruff and irritated, but resigned as well; she sees him visibly deciding not to comment on that last thing she'd said, though it earns her a sideways look. She doesn't blame him for that, though. If she could, she's be giving herself a side-eye.
"Really?" Yuuki blinks at Zero, honestly surprised he's willing to do anything for Aidou beyond put a bullet in him, and he rolls his eyes with a huff.
"Yeah. You're going to help, though."
Yuuki can feel Aidou's eyes on her and Zero through the kitchen doorway, and pointedly does not look in his direction, turning and lowering her hands.
"That's fine. I don't want to go back there, anyway."
Staring with a deadpan expression at Aidou as he primly pats his mouth clean with his cloth napkin and pushes his fourth empty plate away from him across the table, silverware resting atop it, Yuuki can't help her taunt.
"I thought you weren't going to eat anything Zero made, hm?"
"Ah… It wasn't like it's not to my tastes. It's okay, I guess," he comments before dropping the napkin to the table and looking away from her to the side, back towards the kitchen as Yuuki grabs his plate up. "But that wasn't enough."
What a selfish runaway brat- Yuuki inhales slowly to calm herself down.
"You look troubled," Aidou's bland voice pipes up, and Yuuki twitches irritatedly.
"I am," she can't quite get control of herself in time, "but that's fine, because you're going to pay me back for this even if I have to get Kaname to make you." His face closes off, and Yuuki belatedly remembers that Aidou had seen Kaname kill Hiou that night, and likely has more reason than she to be unsettled by it, maybe even afraid. That's not much of an excuse, though.
Yuuki turns with dishes in hand back towards the kitchen, and when she does so, she sees Zero rinsing off the pan in the sink.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you," Yuuki sighs, walking closer to drop the dishes into the sink. "He wants more."
"What?" Zero turns sharply, eyes wide and expression altogether incredulous. "He's eaten enough for eight people and he still wants more?"
"I think he's stress eating," Yuuki confides as she rinses the dishes off, and Zero fishes in his pockets before pulling out his rattling tablet case and handing it over to her.
"Give him a tablet, maybe that will tide him over until the next thing it done," Zero sighs, and Yuuki stares at his back quietly for a minute. He must feel her eyes on him, because a moment later, he asks, "what?"
"Are you sure? I could make him something, and he'll definitely stop bothering us," she offers.
"What happened to not killing him in the house?" Zero quips before shrugging, still not looking over at her. "It's fine, though. It isn't like I hate cooking." Yuuki hesitates before turning to leave, but she hears several quick steps over the floor behind her before a hand grasps onto her shoulder, turning her in place to she's looking into Zero's face.
"What?" She asks, holding the tablets close to her chest as her other hand wraps around them as well.
"If there's something you want to say, then just say it," he commands in a calm tone.
"... Are you okay, so far?" She asks after a pause. "Despite that I-"
"I'm fine," he reassures her, but that sour taste in her mouth doesn't go away. "I'm making my own choices, remember? So," he raises a palm to cover her eyes, though he does so poorly, revealing to her eyes the soft expression on the lower half of his face, "don't give me that look." There's a flood of emotions that Yuuki ignores, forcing her burning eyes to stop what they're doing and stepping back away from Zero's hand, offering him a pained look before she turns, fleeing the room to return to the dining room, where Aidou waits.
"That took too long," he complains childishly, arms crossed over his chest. She suppresses a full-body jerk and flings the rattling tablet case at his head. Irritatingly, he catches it just fine, and looks it over with distant curiosity.
"Blood tablets. Have one before you start complaining again, Zero is making you more food," she commands flatly.
"Are these tablets Kiryuu's?" He asks after a moment of study. Yuuki twitches in agitation, half a thought going to denying it, because who says she can't carry blood tablets for emergency purposes? But he continues before she can put her foot in her mouth. "Don't be upset. Kiryuu knows that I know. Since I'm a genius, it's only natural that I know, after all."
There's so much I could say to that.
"And you're not going to say anything?" She decides to ask, though it's a pointless question. Any student who doesn't already know about Zero's condition doesn't even believe in vampires, at this point, he's not exactly good at hiding it.
"I'm not that cowardly, Cross Yuuki," Aidou says, expression twisting strangely as he avoids looking her in the face. "Anyway, Kaname-sams knows and he's keeping quiet about it, right? Though…" His expression twists just a little more, turning sad, "I don't know what Kaname-sama is thinking, lately…"
"Aidou-"
"Why does he treat a girl like you so specially? Even purposely going against the Senate for you… I can't understand it."
You're such a genius, are you? Yuuki can't help but think a little spitefully. Such a scorned brat, refusing to see what's right in front of him because he's upset.
"Who knows, I guess," she offers with a shrug, arms crossing over her chest as one hand grabs the opposite elbow.
"Are you really saying that?" Aidou asks in a bland tone, a nearly visible miasma of irritation wafting from him, "I'll kill you." Studying him for a moment as he glares at her, trying to intimidate some kind of explanation from her, maybe, Yuuki decides to throw him a bone.
"In my earliest memories," the lie is small but sour on her tongue, not that it would have been a lie even a week ago, "there are two vampires. The first was a vampire that took me by the head, and was going to kill me after he'd gotten what he'd wanted. The second was Kaname, who killed him for touching me, and then picked me up with blood stained hands, and took me to safety. I don't… Really get why he treats me the way he does, but that's where everything starts, for me. It's simple, mostly."
"Simple, huh?" Aidou leans forward, dropping an elbow onto the table and then his chin into his palm. "Simple," he repeats in a musing tone, looking away from her again., "that's what you'll believe, no matter what happens? That it's that simple?"
"It's what I'd prefer," she responds after an uncertain second as Zero walks into the room holding another plate, both of their expressions bland. Aidou looks up to Zero as he sets the plate down.
"This is where I stop feeding you. When you're done, let me know, and I'll take you to the guest room. Yuuki," he turns purple eyes on her and she doesn't flinch at the lack of emotion in them, despite that something in her chest twists painfully. "You can go to your room, if you want," he tells her as he sits down at the table, opposite of Aidou.
"Ah, no, I'm okay. I'll go and do the dishes, though," she comments, turning on heel and walking into the kitchen. She can't hear anything from the dining room as she pulls the dishes out of the sink in order to plug the drain and then runs hot water into the sink, steam rising up into her face as she pours soap in, setting the dishes inside soon after.
It's as she's setting the dishes out to dry that Zero walks back into the kitchen carrying the last of the dishes. She turns from where she'd been about to empty the sink, spotting the dishes and reaching out to accept them.
They enter her hands just fine, but as she turns, something happens with her feet the last second, and one of the bowls slides off the side of the tilted plate, careening downward. She reaches out as fast as she can with one hand full, but ends up spiking the bowl into the ground with even more force, sending the white porcelain shattering across the tile.
Staring at the glass, her eyes track to her bare feet in the middle of the mess, then the sink a few steps away, and then the plate in her hands before looking back at the bowl shards.
"Zero, if I move, my feet will be ribbons," she says in a calm way she doesn't really feel. Off to the side, he sighs in an aggravated way.
"Stay there," he commands before turning, walking from the room and coming back a minute later with house slippers on his feet, another pair in his hand as well as a broom. "I couldn't find the dustpan," he comments as he puts the broom on the counter along with her slippers and then walks closer, carefully shifting the bigger porcelain shards out of the way before grabbing her beneath the armpits, lifting her off the ground, taking some steps back, and then depositing her on the ground in a safer area.
She grabs her slippers and slips them onto her feet before snatching the broom before he can grab it, pushing the dishes in her hands off onto him in the process.
"I'll sweep this up, it's my mess, after all. You can wash these, my hands feel like softened raisins from all the other washing," she complains before turning to do just that, broom ready. He watches her for awhile before huffing and circling the shards to get to the sink, dishes in hand.
Clean up goes smoothly until one of the smaller pieces is revealed to have somehow stuck to the ground, so Yuuki kneels down to pick at it with her nails, trying to dislodge it while carefully making sure it can't get free then fly into her eye. She doesn't manage to get it free before it slices deeply across the tip of her pointer finger, drawing a hiss from her as she wrenches her hand away and pokes the finger into her mouth irritably, glaring at the glass which is now free, but is also covered liberally in her blood.
There's the sound of silverware clattering slightly above her, and Yuuki's eyes dart up to see Zero having frozen completely still where he's drying the dishes, the drain rumbling and suctioning the the background as deliberately breathes slowly and then turns.
"Don't just manhandle broken glass, you moron," he comments in a flat tone, eyeing her hand still in her mouth with something like fond resignation. "I swear…"
"It isn't my fault," she protests his tone, pulling her still bleeding finger from her mouth to glare at him and speak clearly. Blood slides down the side of the digit quickly enough, and she sees a flicker of red in Zero's eyes before it's pushed down. She frowns and circles around the counter until she reaches the paper towels. Wrapping her finger in one, she turns to look at Zero, who's looking away from her now.
"Does Aidou still have your tablets?" She asks leadingly. He shakes his head and reaches into his pocket to grab out his case, opening it before pausing and glancing in her direction. She quirks an eyebrow as she folds her injured hand into a fist to give her finger pressure. He rolls his eyes before reaching into a cabinet, pulling a cup down, and then walking to the sink. As he does so, she makes her way back to the broom, beginning to sweep again, moving the glass to the corner of the kitchen so it's out of the way.
"We'll have to mop the kitchen soon," she comments as she shepards all the glass away. "I don't know if I got all of the glass. And also find the dustpan," she finishes, eyeing the pile before crouching down, reaching out with her uninjured hand to carefully pluck the biggest pieces of porcelain out and drop them into her other palm.
"Are you- Yuuki," Zero grits out, grabbing onto the back of her sweater and hauling her literally into the air and carrying her bodily away from the glass. "Leave the glass alone."
"But I won't get cut on the bigger pieces," she protests, carefully not clutching tightly onto the glass in her hand as she almost does reflexively. She does not want to slice open her palm, thanks.
"Leave it alone, Yuuki," he repeats. She huffs a little and rolls her eyes.
"I still have glass in my hand, you know. I need to throw it out," she notes blandly. He jolts her a little and then sets her down near the trash can, as far from the glass corner as possible, apparently, and stares at her expectantly.
"Stay away from the glass," he says a final time before giving her a warning look and turning away from her, walking towards the kitchen sink. She rolls her eyes, rotating the glass in her hands for a moment, thoughtfully, before dropping the glass into the trash can. She then looks up to stare at Zero's back quietly, wanting to talk, to try and offer some sort of white flag, because how they're acting right now around each other hurts, but she says nothing.
Their privacy is not guaranteed, after all. She doesn't want Aidou to eavesdrop and hear something he's not meant to.