AN: Part 2, loaded and ready to go! Hope you all enjoy!

Different fonts represent different languages. Italics represents Halkeginia's language,Underlines represent Japanese,Italics and underlines denotes hand sign communication, and normal font represents English.

Important: if you are uncomfortable with the topic of suicide, please do not read the latter half of this chapter, or stop reading the fic altogether if it is too sensitive a topic.

-o0o-

Nero quietly and quickly walked through the halls, glancing to and fro to make sure that all the doors were closed. He had already passed by the blonde mage with the frog familiar a while back, having signaled with his hands to quickly return to her bed; and tiptoed his way past a young couple's romantic get together when he realized he should not ruin the mood. Silently he thanked his good fortune that he had only two encounters.

His head perked up when he caught the sound of light footsteps ahead of him. Seeing the hallway turn, he assumed the person was about to come around the corner, judging by the increasing volume of their gait. What appeared was the short blue haired, glasses wearing girl from earlier in the day. A brown cloak was draped over her shoulders as she clutched a book to her chest. Her blue-green eyes widened and then narrowed when she saw Nero.

"Good evening," she replied in monotone.

"Uh… 'good evening' back to you," he replied, hoping that what she said was a greeting and not a question.

The girl merely gave an unamused smile at the white haired man.

"So uh… you heading to bed?" He tried to communicate with his hands.

The girl gave a deadpan glare at his sign language before replying, however, it was not with her mouth.

"Yes. I will sleep," she motioned with her hands.

Nero widened his eyes, but mentally breathed a sigh of relief.

"Alright. Go to bed, soon. Ok?"

She nodded, but then asked a question of her own.

"Why are you awake?"

Remembering what Dante told him, he signaled, "Trying to use magic to go back home. It did not work."

She frowned.

"You are not mages. Why are you using magic?"

'Carp,' Nero mentally scolded himself. 'Played my hand too early.'

"Magic brought us here, so magic could bring us back."

"Preposterous. You are attempting to use magic, unsupervised, to bring yourselves back home?"

Nero began to sweat.

"Yes…?" his nervousness portrayed in the slow movement of his hands.

"...You are lying," Tabitha signed.

Nero immediately put himself on alert.

"What makes you say that? For all you know the headmaster is there helping us!"

"I just passed by the headmaster, and I can guarantee it was not an illusion. You are hiding something, and you don't want anyone else to find out."

'Chip, she is sharp!' Nero thought to himself as he recalled what his uncle and father told him.

"Take me there," she signed.

Nero's eyes widened in shock.

"Take me there, or I will search every corner of this school myself to find what you are doing."

"No way! Why would I? Why in the heck do you wanna find out so bad anyways?!"

"Why would I, a student at a magic academy, be suspicious of a group of people who somehow managed to counter the binding ritual, and be suspicious of the same people who suddenly decided to cast magic on their own at the academy I attend? Hard to say why, perhaps you can explain."

While that was not what she had signed to the hunter, Nero assumed this was the message she was getting across with her deadpan glare and motions. Nero mentally struck himself as he attempted to find a way out of this.

"Look, I promise we are not doing anything suspicious!" Nero signed to her.

'Heck I barely even know why Dante wanted me to keep this secret in the first place!' he thought to himself.

"Then it should be easy enough to prove."

Nero glanced over his shoulder, and Tabitha followed his gaze.

"Look, just go the sleep and-"

"So what you're doing is back over there, is it? Very well," she cut him off mid-sign. She then walked past him going in the direction of where he came.

"Hey! Wait!" Nero called out.

She sped up her pace and so did Nero. He stretched out a hand when he was in arm's reach, attempting to grab her cloak and slow her down. However, she slipped away from his grasp, thanks to a simple spell that allowed her to float on the wind.

"Dang it, wait!" he called as she rounded a corner.

She gave him one last deadpan look before his figure was covered by the stone walls. However, when she turned her gaze forward once more, she immediately collided with something, and was thrown back by the recoil.

"Wha-" she said as she neared the floor.

A hand grabbed hers before she could hit the floor, however, and pulled her forwards a bit. Another hand snaked around the small of her back, stabilizing her.

"Are you okay?" a voice asked her.

-o0o-

Her blue-green eyes then focused on the figure before her.

The night wind did little to chill the heat coming off of her tear stained cheeks. No matter how much the gentle breeze tried, the warmth of her despair stubbornly clung onto her skin. Her tear glossed eyes stared towards the star lit sky, as her black cape fluttered in the wind behind her. She did not know how her feet dragged her towards the roof of the academy, but such a thing was a trivial matter in her mind now. She had only one thought in mind.

She held her breath, and swallowed her fear. She placed both of her hands to her small chest, and gave one last prayer to all those she knew that had given her kindness. She then begged for forgiveness for her incompetence. With one motion, she stepped forward, letting gravity cradle her down off the roof.

For a moment it was peaceful. Letting go of the weight after so long was soul freeing. She had nothing left to worry about, nothing left to prove. For once she could enjoy the night breeze, and bask in the scent of the dark air. She let out the breath she was holding, letting the weight she was carrying crush her completely. Only the burden never came crashing down. The weight on her shoulder was stopped by a kind hand, who gently pulled her back from the darkness.

"Just in time," a voice breathed in exhaustion, "gave me quite the runaround, Pinky. I'm lucky the kitchen was locked so I could narrow down where ya went."

Louise turned around to see the man in red beneath her, having grabbed her clothing and reeled her back onto him, collapsing on the floor to cushion the impact.

"Are you okay?" he asked in her native language.

Louise did not give him a reply.

She instead slammed her dainty hands into his chest with all the force she could muster.

"Why?"

slam*

"WHY?!"

She grabbed his red shirt, hands squeezing the fabric in quiet fury.

"WHY ARE YOU HERE?! WHY DID YOU DO THIS?!"

Dante gave no reply, merely staring down the girl's tear stained eyes.

"Why…?" she began to ask.

She pressed her forehead to his chest, tears once more flowing from her eyes.

"Why… why did you…"

Dante slowly draped an arm around her back. The other gently stroked her hair as she continued to cry.

"Why… why did you save me…?"

A moment of sobs passed between them.

"You looked like you needed help."

Her breath hitched in her throat, causing choked sobs to burst forth.

"Let it out. It's okay to cry."

"Shut up…" she replied, "I… I am not crying! A… A Zero like me doesn't deserve to cry…"

"You're wrong. Everyone deserves to cry. It does not matter who they are."

Dante looked up at the stars, with old memories flashing through his head.

"Be they a Queen, or a Zero. In fact, somewhere out there," he said, then paused to think, wanting to get the correct translation across to the sobbing teen.

"Somewhere out there… even a Devil May Cry in moments like these."

At that Louise let the dam break. The flood of tears thoroughly soaked the man's clean clothes, and her wails could be heard across the rooftop. Dante said nothing else, merely patting the girl's head as he carried the burden she dropped. He would let her take it back eventually, but only once the tears dried up. Until then, he will give her as much time as she needs to heal her broken soul.

So he let her cry. Falling from her cheeks, her tears in the night.

-End of Chapter 6-

AN: "1 down, 2 to go." Wait, uh... reverse that. Hope you all like the chapter! part 3 is coming soon, so keep your eyes peeled! And keep on maintaining that Smokin' Sexy Style!