Thanks for the positive feedback I was really worried that this story would be going nowhere. So one to the next chapter read and review. Oh and this is kind of on the long side. Enjoy.

Previous week

The next week went by agonizingly slow because of my anticipation for being able to finally get a moroi to guard. It was great that liss and I where talking again, but we really didn't have to much to talk about seeing as we had both been kind of blocked off from the rest of academy life. We would often just sit there and talk about how we couldn't wait to go back to class. But once we had that figured out we were silent again. Christian and I on the other hand, were great. We did a lot together if it wasn't for the fact that I was excused you would think that I had been his guardian. I was going to therapy two times a week and was getting a lot accomplished feeling a lot happier even though I knew I was nowhere near being done with this mess. Adrian tried and failed to get me to talk to him and Eddie finally stopped blaming himself for lissa's accident and started lightening up. So yeah all in all good week but a slow one.

Monday

"hey Rose." I heard Eddie yell from behind me, he had been on a 'sabbatical' since his charge was in no shape to continue classed just yet. Only I am sure that he was enjoying it a lot more than I had what with my mood being everywhere.

"Hey Castile" I yelled looking over my shoulder to see him running with Christian in toe.

"where's the fire?" I asked looking at guys. Eddie looked as if he had just got finish with a morning jog, his face all a glow and little beads of sweat made there way down his face. Christian on the other hand while he was strong, looked like he was just force to run a marathon in under ten minutes. It took all I had not to crack up at both of them.

"well, we asked if we could, you know take a senior field trip." Eddie said still panting a little.

I immediately got excited but then realized, we aren't a normal high school and our last "senior trip" ended horribly. Loosing one student in the escape.

"who did you ask?" I said trying to keep indifference in my voice, Dimitri is so good at it but I knew I still had some work to do in that department.

"Alberta" christian said sitting on the bench beside me.

"and…?" I asked waiting for them to continue.

"well she said that she would talk to Kirova but told us to petition it before she does, when we asked I told her it would be a safe way for us to learn how to protect our moroi in the real world and all that."

"but eddie just wants to ride the rides." christian said.

"wait where did you ask to go?"

"this indoor amusement park, I went once with my mom when I was younger and it would be fun." eddie spoke up.

"so she wants us to petition it?" I said starting to smile.

"yep"

"and how many signatures do we need"

"well that's the beauty of it we just need the moroi to sign really, their guardians would have to go anyway." Christian said now wearing the same stupid smirk as me.

"you guys are genius," I said pulling them both into a hug. "but speaking of Guardians I need to see Alberta about who I'm guarding for the field experience."

"oh I thought you were going to guard me?" christian asked once I release both of them from my chokehold/hug.

"I am but I still have to ask and get put in I mean what good is guarding you if I'm not getting graded for it?" I joked.

"I'm not that bad." he said lightly punching my shoulder.

"didn't you ever learn that it is rude to hit a lady" I said laughing more.

"uh well when you show me a lady Rose I promise I won't hit her." Christian and eddie both began laughing insanely loud.

I had been laughing to until I saw something all black in the corner of my eye. At first I thought it was the wind blowing the tree until I noticed that both christian and Eddie had stopped laughing. By the time I saw it again it was charging at christian from behind. I couldn't make words form as he lunged. So I did the only thing that I knew how to do, I yanked christian behind me and landed a nice upper cut to the black clad guardian. I saw eddie pull christian aside as I began fighting the strigoi wannabe.

I both threw and received a few kicks and punches before we where both on the ground. I hadn't bothered to see who my attacker was because at the moment he was my attacker. But something about the way he smelled made me realize who I was fighting. Making me fight even harder as if I had something to prove.

When I had finally gotten him pinned I noticed that I didn't have a stake. "eddie?" I yelled trying my best to hold him down. If I hadn't been tired before, this was sure to do the trick because he was strong. The only other problem being that I wastired. I had to fight for about fifteen minutes before getting him to the ground and another five before pinning him. "shit" I mumbled when he managed to get and arm free and push me off. I saw his eyes flicker over to where Christian stood unprotected. "shit" I said again. Eddie had left him to find a novice with a stake. Funny how the quad is exceptionally empty today. I stood up not wanting to waste time and tackled him from behind. It didn't take him down but I was on his back normally in these situations the strigoi would be rendered unconscious by a broken neck but I couldn't actually crack his neck so I choked him. It was a distraction that would slow him down if nothing else.

It had worked because by the time he had gotten to Christian, Eddie had reappeared holding a practice stake and without hesitation pointed it to where the strigoi heart would be. " your dead Dimitri" I mumbled. Letting myself slip off his back. My entire body ached after that one. It felt good to fight again but I felt that if I had stayed in practice I wouldn't have been as tired as I am now.

"very good Rose, you managed to 'incapacitate' me" He said with a wide grin on his face. "you have gotten better"

"why did you attack, Christian doesn't have a Guardian, Eddie is on break and I didn't have a stake." I said out of breath.

"your not always going to have what you need in order to kill a strigoi, you made that clear a while ago, in the real world being on break doesn't matter to strigoi they see it as an opportunity as they did with me and Ivan, and as for Christian, well the ozera name isn't a very popular name among moroi or dhampir so the likelihood of Queen Tatiana granting him a Guardian is slim." he said.

"Tasha has a guardian" Christian said.

"Because she asked for one, and I agreed"

"yeah we know" Christian said. I could see the temper flaring, he was trying to put himself in the middle of my fight. Very sweet but also very stupid. "or had you not noticed all the hell that broke loose the week before last."

"let it go Christian" I said grabbing his arm. This brought him out of his trance as he loosened back up.

"never thought I'd see the day when you would be calming someone down Rose." eddie said in attempt to switch gears.

"yeah well I am to doped on adrenaline and extremely excited about the trip, to give a damn about what happened two weeks ago." I said nonchalantly.

"sorry Rose" Christian mumbled. Dimitri was silent but was watching the three of us intently.

"oh we have to hurry up if we're going to catch Al-Guardian Petrov before she leaves her office."

"What do you need with her?" Dimitri asked curiosity getting the best of him.

"that's my business" he said coldly. But if I knew him and I did I knew that he had another comment up his sleeve. And as if he read my mind he looked back at me questioningly. I nodded my head. If you must Ozera, if you must.

Dimitri looked like he wanted to punch Christian at the moment but knew that he wouldn't hear the end of it from Tasha. I had a feeling christian knew to which was why he was pushing his luck.

"if you must know though, I going to ask for a guardian, and I think rose would be more than agreeable." he said snaking an arm around my waist.

I tried and failed to hold back the laughter that was now erupting from deep inside. Dimitri took a step forward hands clenched but then faltered. I was now full on laughing in his face. I know that it was rude, but that was something I would have said. I have done things to get a rise out of dimitri before with Adrian at the ski lodge. Poor Eddie looked like he was trying his hardest not to laugh at his expression and Christian was just soaking it up.

I looked between Christian and Dimitri while they were apparently having a stare off. I really wanted to see how this would play out but my desire to actually participate was killing me now that I had actually taken down Dimitri I was pretty cocky. no pun intended.

"now that you've had you fun can we go." I said unwrapping his arm but not letting go of his hand. He and dimitri continued to stare at one another. "you know sometime before the rest of the school Graduates" I said tugging him. Wordlessly he let himself be pulled in the direction of the main guardian office.

" I think that you may have officially pissed him off" I said before we were out of earshot.

"yeah well nephew privileges, he is family now after all" he said the last part through closed teeth.

"give him a chance, he'll grow on you" I said without thinking.

"I thought you hated him."

"I thought I told you that it didn't matter whether I did or not." I said. Regretting it the moment I did. That was the night when I almost had rebound sex with Christian. He blamed himself for not stopping sooner and I blamed myself for leading him on. So we did what anyone in our situation would do, We ignored it and up until now it was working pretty well.

Sensing my frustration at bringing it up he shot me a sidelong glance. "you know we will have to talk about it eventually."

"I know but we will but it will end the same way, with both of us blaming ourselves. so can we just go back to ignoring that particular part of the night?" I said as he held the door open for me.

"whatever you say" he said catching up to me.

"I mean it." I said smirking. " it didn't happen"

"what didn't happen" he said playing with my words.

I just decided to roll my eyes taking that to mean he would drop the subject. We were only a few feet away from Alberta's door when we saw Tasha exit. She stopped short when she saw us and glared at Christian. Wow her glare was almost as good as mine only difference was that mine was actually better.

"hey aunt Tasha what's wrong?" christian said smiling.

"we are going to have a nice long chat once Alberta is through with the two of you." she said to the both of us.

"wait what did I do" I said. I knew what it was about but I seriously didn't know why I was getting in trouble over his little staring contest with GuardianBelikov.

"we will discuss it later." she said as she walked past us.

"great, I bet that will be a mood killer" I said to myself but christian just looked amused.

We continued walking and noticed that Dimitri was standing in the corner across from Alberta's desk. Damn he was fast.

"I heard that you wanted to ask me to grant Rose permission to Guard you?" she spoke first.

"actually I was going to ask permission to guard him" I spoke up.

"I see, but you know that we are not always assigned who we want as guardians" she said continuing to speak to christian. "am I to understand that you made a sexual innuendo towards miss Hathaway?"

"I…wait what?" he asked looking confused. I shot dimitri a ferocious glare before looking back at Alberta.

"did you or did you not make a suggestive remark about Rose?"

"all I said was that she was agreeable" he said looking a little less confident. Dimitri was going to pay.

"while doing what?"

"nothing that's all I said."

"well Guardian belikov has told me that you had your arms around her waist, in a very public display of affection."

"and since when is that wrong?"

"the context in which you where doing this was wrong, and as for you miss Hathaway I would think that after your last experience you wouldn't want to draw that kind of attention to yourself." she said. Oh yeah dimitri was definitely going to pay.

"there was no one out there, and Christian and I are just friends, and he was joking." I said letting my voice stay level. Because christian who was now glaring at dimitri looked as if he would set fire to the whole damn academy. So me loosing my cool would further escalate things.

"yes, well if Jesse or Ralf had made a comment like that you would have put them through a wall." she said in a matter of fact tone.

"yeah well I'm not dating Jesse or Ralf." I said my voice getting a little louder.

"and your dating Lord Ozera?" she said giving him his formal title.

I couldn't say anything, where we dating? I hadn't actually meant to make it sound like I was dating Christian it just came out that way.

"Christian?" she said turning to him sensing that I either couldn't or wouldn't answer.

"we don't know yet, she told you we where just friends," he said looking away from dimitri and at me.

"I see, but no matter, you will refrain from implying sexual acts with any female on this campus do I make my self clear, it is very unbecoming of a young moroi and it give you a bad name."

Just take ivashkov for example.

As if we where thinking the same thing he started to smile while I was trying to hold back laughter myself.

"may I hear the joke?" she asked indifference on her face.

"you…are…telling." I couldn't do it I began to laugh again. This was a obviously a really good night. I struggled to catch my breath. Surprisingly she waited. Once I had settled down some I continued. "okay, whew, sorry, anyway, you're telling Christian to stop with the comments but you just had a full grown man in a very um…compromising position with your student. A man who in fact is neither teacher nor student."

"well I fail to see how that's funny."

"well I guess you have to be standing in our shoes. After the week we had every damn thing wrong with this place is hilarious." I said wiping tears off of my face. "and it's something that my counselor told me to do, she said laugh off anything wrong. It makes it easier to deal with, which is funny because that's what sarcasm is. And it helps."

"that I can understand, I am glad to see you take counseling seriously."

"yep, so now that we have that all figured out, may I be Christian's guardian?" I asked.

"I Don't see why not, but just remember that in the real world."

"I won't always get someone I like, got it." I said.

"okay well here is your training booklet, you info packet and your practice stake." she said getting up from behind the desk to hand me all of these things. "and I have heard that you succeeded in handling Guardian belikov Earlier that will go on record as your first test congrats." she said. Ah this was the Alberta I liked easygoing and accepting.

"thank you" I said smiling all over myself. "may we be excused" I nearly shouted out of excitement.

"yes, go pack a bag and you will be bunking with Christian" she said. My excitement drained.

"I what?"

"will be bunking with christian, how do you expect to guard him from across campus? Is something wrong?"

Uh yeah we didn't tell you this but last time I was in his room we almost committed a sin. "no ma'am" I said instead. Hoping no one else noticed. Who was I kidding of course they noticed but before I could say anything I grabbed Christian's arm and drug him out of her office knowing I would have to face it with someone I just preferred for it not to be Alberta and a very blanked faced Dimitri.

Well what did you think? I thought the whole sarcasm thing was funny. (that's what my friend's sister said to her when her and her boyfriend broke up.) Tasha is back in the picture for a bit I think this should be fun.