A/N: /sigh/ It seems like one must have a bad case of cold in order to have time to write…

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Bloody nurse

Chapter 8

Yuuki was sitting alone in the chairman's office, in a chair right in front of the desk, waiting. All she could hear was the steady ticking of a clock placed somewhere in the room. She felt relatively calm, her eyes, not focusing on anything in particular, lowered to her lap.

The whole incident felt almost like a dream to her in the brightly lit room. It seemed so far away. The darkness of Kaname's chambers gave the whole experience an almost artificial tint. Had it all truly happened?

Yuuki's eyes drifted to her left hand and she turned it over to examine her palm for what seemed like the hundredth time in the past ten minutes. There was no sign of the former cut or any blood whatsoever. Kaname's powers healed it completely, leaving it as good as before.

Yuuki gasped as the memory of Kaname's bright red eyes flashed across her mind. She could still recall the image so vividly. It was the only proof for her at that moment that it really did happen.

Before she had time to think about it some more, she heard footsteps in the corridor, briskly approaching the door. She turned her head around just in time to see Zero enter the room.

He closed the door quietly behind him and slowly moved to the Chairman's desk, his face an expressionless mask, his eyes never meeting Yuuki's. He leaned against the front of the desk, his hands gently gripping the edge of it, his ankles crossed. His head remained downcast, some strands of hair falling over his eyes. After this, all movement in the room ceased, the ticking of the clock resuming its dominant position again.

Yuuki tried to peer at Zero's face, or what she could see of it. He reminded her of a marble statue dressed in a school uniform, no necktie, both jacket and vest undone, as well as the two top buttons of his shirt. He was actually standing very close to her, their knees almost touching. He remained still and quiet for what seemed like forever.

Yuuki remained silent as well; she was not going to shatter the peaceful silence with something embarrassing coming out of her mouth. She could still recall with clarity Zero's rage upon barging into Kaname's bedroom, the shouting that ensued, Ichijou's restraining hands, the Chairman's words of reason, Kaname's impassive behaviour…

Yuuki closed her eyes as the memories came rushing back. It all happened too fast. Before she could even get a word in, she was being dragged out of the room and her thoughts were all jumbled after that. She should have tried more. She should have tried to explain it all…

"Are you ok?" asked Zero so suddenly that it made Yuuki's head snap up towards him. His head was still bowed downwards.

It took Yuuki a moment to find her voice but in the end she replied: "Um, yes." That would have to do for the moment. She was scared of saying anything else.

Zero took a deep breath through his nose. "You sure?"

Yuuki nodded her head, though he probably couldn't see it. "Yes, I am."

After this, Zero returned to his statue mode again.

Yuuki was feeling extremely uncomfortable. She knew very well that the worst was yet to come. When she realized that Zero was not going to say anything more, she dropped her gaze back down. Her eyes roamed over the front of his jacket, realizing that it was torn in one spot and that it was missing a button as well. And then her eyes landed on his right hand. Her eyes widened at the sight of the blood covering his knuckles, the few stains on the cuff of his shirt, and her mind went back to the loud brawl back in Kaname's chambers.

"Are you ok?" she asked him timidly, never moving her eyes away from his hand.

Zero's brows furrowed at her question but when he followed the direction of her gaze he sighed and impatiently waved the bloodied hand in the direction of the broken cabinet to his right.

Upon seeing the trashed piece of furniture, Yuuki's expression morphed into one of confusion. "What exactly happ-"

"Forget about that," he interrupted her forcefully, staring down at her with the hardest of gazes.

Yuuki tried holding his gaze but it was proving to be a very difficult task. She felt as if she was shrinking in her seat.

"What were you thinking?" he asked her rather calmly, his voice and his expression completely out of sync.

Yuuki didn't know if she should even venture answering that question. She looked back down at her own hands. "He needed help," she said in the quietest of voices.

At this, Zero snorted and crossed his arms over his chest. "Help, right," he said as if to himself. "And you thought you'd save the day by visiting the dog's den."

Yuuki's head snapped up at his scornful words. "I was the only one who could help him, Zero, it was my responsibility, since I was the cause of his suffering!"

"Your responsibility, eh?"

"Of course it was! And I would've done anything to help him, I owe him at least that much. If my blood is what it-"

"Don't! Please don't tell me you knew what you were in for when you left for that place! I'd rather blame this on your naivety than blind stupidity!"

Yuuki's mouth fell open in disbelief.

Zero ran his clean hand through his hair in frustration.

For some time, the ticking of the clock was the only sound in the room again.

All of a sudden, Yuuki felt extremely tired. The evening was way too eventful for her liking. She was exhausted; she wanted this day to end. But first of all, she had to end this quarrel…

"Look, Zero, I'm sorry for making you worried, but I'm not sorry for what I've done…"

Zero shook his head from side to side, a bitter smirk marring his face. "I told you, haven't I, that I didn't want you to meddle in this time, that it might be too much. You never listen…" he said almost dejectedly, looking away to the side.

Yuuki sighed tiredly, leaning back against the backrest, closing her eyes in the process. "I'm fine, Zero, nothing bad happened. I managed to do what I wanted to do and I'm still me, the same old stubborn annoying never-listening me," she said and opened her eyes, only to squeal and jump in surprise, as Zero's face was hovering only a few centimetres away from hers.

He caged her in her seat, with his arms on either side of her, supporting his weight on the armrests, his cold sharp eyes boring into hers.

Yuuki sat still for what seemed like minutes, when he finally rasped out: "I can smell your blood on you."

For reasons unknown to her, she blushed at his words. "Um, yeah, I cut my hand in order to…um…well…but it's healed and clean now, so…" she trailed off as Zero bent his head to one side, closer to her shoulder and took several whiffs along her arm.

"That's not it," he said and neared her skirt. "This is already dried but there's quite a lot of it…"

Yuuki blushed even harder and grabbed his shoulder. "Zero, what are you-"

"What's in your pocket?" he suddenly asked and straightened back up.

Yuuki blinked at him stupidly several times, until she recovered. "Oh, right!" she said, reached into the pocket of her skirt and pulled out the bloodied handkerchief, which was wrapped around her hand earlier.

Zero hissed at the sight and turned his head away, trying to breathe through his mouth only.

Yuuki realised her mistake and quickly pocketed the offending object. "Sorry…"

Zero only grunted at that.

After several more seconds of silence, Yuuki was overcome by a mouth splitting, jaw dislocating yawn.

Watching her rub one of her eyes with her fist like a small child, complete with a pout, Zero sighed: "Go to bed, it's pretty late. School tomorrow."

"I hate school," whined Yuuki as she got to her feet and started in the direction of the door.

When her hand reached for the doorknob, Zero spoke up: "One more thing, Yuuki."

She turned her head to look at him. He was leaning against the desk with his arms crossed again, staring at the floor.

"I'm glad you decided to use your brain in the end," he said and looked up at her. "It was all pretty stupid of you to begin with, but at least you're still you."

"Zero, Kaname-sempai wouldn't-"

"No, save your breath, you know what I think about them all…"

And perhaps he was right, Yuuki thought, because if there's something she found out that night, it's that there is a side to Kaname-sama, which she doesn't know, which she might not be able to trust so fully. After all, this encounter was really close. She came very close to changing her life, to changing her light into darkness, her days into nights…

She smiled weakly at him. "Good night," she said and exited the office.

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"Ah, we'll have to order the special cleaning services, I see," said Ichijou in a cheery voice, as he looked around the finally lit study of Kaname's chambers.

Kaname, for his part, was standing by one of the tall windows, twirling a wineglass in his fingers, remaining silent.

"I'll start putting all these glasses in this box here, so that you can have some space to move around this room and have them carried out later, if that's fine with you."

"Yes, thank you, Ichijou."

"I'm glad to finally be of at least some help to you. We were all so worried this past week," he said as he bent for another glass.

"I appreciate your sentiments."

"I'm sure the others have felt the change by now, they'll all be thrilled to see you well again," said Ichijou, smiling all the time.

Kaname slowly ran his free hand down the soft heavy material of the curtains hanging by the window. "How's the shoulder?" he asked, still facing the window.

"All healed by now, and very worth it, I might add," he laughed, "And I'd do it - Oh…" he suddenly trailed off, as he reached the place where most of the shards were strewn.

Kaname turned around to see what the matter was.

Ichijou picked one of the shards up and held it between his thumb and index finger. One tip of it was slightly smeared with blood.

Kaname walked over to where Ichijou was standing and extended the hand with the wineglass towards him. Ichijou looked up at Kaname for just a brief moment and then dropped the shard into the glass, where it made a soft clink.

"Yuuki-chan really is special, isn't she," smiled Ichijou again.

Kaname kept on twirling the wineglass, watching the shard at the bottom of it. "That, she is."

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A/N: Those of you who are still reading this, even though it almost never gets updated, you have my heart.

Please feel free to bring any mistakes to my attention.

Take care,

Matylda