They arrived in Tokyo, keeping silent most of the way. Momo could tell Mina wanted to talk, but she was holding her tongue. The beginning of their trip had been filled with Mina briefly going over the case files with Momo, but after that there wasn’t much to say. Momo’s disgust for vampires made Mina uncomfortable and she didn’t want to force a friendship between them. As long as they could get along well enough for this mission, all would be fine.

         Momo walked beside Mina to the hotel they were to be staying at. It wasn’t anything fancy, on the contrary it was a love hotel they’d be renting by the hour. Momo’s nostrils flared in silent revulsion as she allowed Mina to drag her into the lobby. She approached the desk and talked to the lady behind the counter with a pleasant smile on her face. Momo’s dark eyes roamed around the room, she didn’t know what to think. There was a vending machine across from her that dispensed . She shook her head in defeat and headed to Mina’s side.

         “I don’t know how long we’ll be staying exactly,” Mina said, “But probably until tomorrow morning.” The woman behind the counter looked at each of the girls for a moment, seeming to not be at all fazed. It wasn’t long before they were handed a key and told their room number.

         Mina looped her arm with Momo’s as they headed toward the elevator that would take them two floors up.

         “You don’t have to look so uncomfortable,” Mina said as the elevator door closed. Momo pulled her arm free from Mina’s. “There’s a reason we’re here. Remember how I mentioned that other vampire, Sana?” Momo nodded her head as the elevator door opened. “This is her hotel. She bought it last year and has been running a discreet human trafficking business from within these very walls.” Mina stretched her arms out so they touched either wall of the narrow corridor they had stepped into from the elevator. “Like I said on the train; the agents that went missing were last seen in this neighborhood. I have a feeling Sana has something to do with it. If I’m right… they might already be dead. Or on their way to South Korea where Sana’s boss resides.”

         Momo watched as Mina opened the door to their room. She stepped to the side and let Momo enter first. Momo took her shoes off at the door and crossed the room to the bed, where she took a seat, blocking from her mind the kinds of things people had done in this very room. The door closed and Mina entered the room, discarding her jacket to the floor. She opened up her small luggage bag and pulled out the case files and a laptop. She placed them neatly on the coffee table, before settling on the floor.

         “We need to gain access to wherever she keeps the people she wants to sell. They usually sell those who have sweet blood, people who take care of themselves. Since our agents are in good shape, they will hopefully still be alive. In fact, their chances are doubled if they are found out to be vampire hunters. They’re worth a pretty penny. Her boss in Korea might even buy them for himself. He’ll drag all the information out of them, kill them and then probably send the bodies back to us,” Mina looked up from her laptop and into Momo’s eyes. “I’ve seen it happen before. He’s a ruthless man.”

         “Who is he? Are the agents in South Korea doing anything on their end?” Momo asked. Tensions were often high between Korea and Japan, but those who hunted vampires all wanted the same thing and usually saw past their differences.

         Mina turned her laptop around so that Momo could see the profile she had pulled up. “Lee Minhyuk. A level five vampire. Leader of a large clan in Seou. He has many vampires under his belt, runs the largest human trafficking ring in Seoul, especially now with Sana under his wing, sending him bodies from Tokyo. Our guys leave him alone, we can’t touch him. The vampire hunters in Seoul ignore him, instead tackling smaller prey, which only helps him more. They take out his competition and he only grows more powerful.”

         Momo crossed the room to get a better look at his profile. Her eyes scanned his picture first, took in his sharp features and dark hair, memorizing his face for a later date. She moved down to his information, trying to store every little fact about him in her memory.

         “We don’t need to worry about him. We’re focusing on taking out his suppliers. Once that’s out of the way the Seoul hunters will get to work on him. Sana being his main supplier in Japan,” Mina turned the laptop back around and began typing something, “she is our target.” She turned the laptop around once again and this time a picture of a very pretty female was on display. “This is Minatozaki Sana. A level four vampire. If she can manage to break free from Lee Minhyuk’s hold, she’ll be on his level and almost impossible for us to touch without taking out thousands of other vampires first. Already it’s difficult for us to get a hold on her. Luckily I still have contacts from back when I was first turned. I managed to track her whereabouts to this hotel. She targets females on most occasions. She seems to… Are you even paying attention to me?”

         Momo’s mouth was slightly agape, her eyes glazed over. She had a hand on either side of the laptop monitor. “I recognize her…. But… I don’t….” Momo shook her head and closed her eyes, trying to think back to where she could have possibly seen this woman before. She didn’t think they had learned about her in the institute.

         Mina narrowed her eyes and tapped her fingers on the table. “Look, Momo, you probably learned about her at the institute, or saw her photo in a meeting. She’s risen to a level four from a level one in just six months. We thought she was nothing to write home about, but we were wrong. When she was in Osaka she was practically harmless. Sure she killed a few people and turned some as well. But she wasn’t doing it every night or even every month. Now, her numbers have grown upwards of ninety percent. She takes people from this hotel – from other sleazy hotels in the area, too. As I was saying before, she targets women. She entices them, lures them to her with alcohol, drugs, her own appeal. She builds their trust while they can’t think straight. Most vampires have humans or their newly transformed grunts to do the dirty work, but she most often does it herself. If you see her, you need to be aware. Don’t forget her face. She will hurt you.”

         Momo looked up from the screen and nodded once to show she understood. Sana was dangerous. All vampires were dangerous. Mina turned the screen back towards her and was silent for awhile. Not sure what to do, Momo opened up the case files and looked them over once more. An hour or so had passed before Mina stood up abruptly and stretched her limbs.

         “What should we do tonight?”

         “What?” Momo asked, looking up from the documents, her eyes tired from reading so many words.

         Mina crossed the room to look at a dispenser of some sort. “Look, they have flavored condoms… and underwear… and lube,” Mina said with a giggle. “Have you ever been to one of these places?”

         “Once, a few years ago with my ex,” Momo said, her voice unnaturally quiet and her cheeks tinged pink. “We were still in high school so...”

         “You had no where else to go and you didn’t want mommy and daddy to know,” Mina said with a wink.

         “You?”

         “Eh, I come to these places all the time on business. They can be quite cheap when I only need to set up a hideout for a few hours.”

         “What about before you worked as a hunter?” Momo asked, suddenly wanting to know a little more about her partner. Maybe if she knew more she could see her as less of a monster and more of a victim. It wasn’t Mina’s fault she was a vampire after all. And she seemed to genuinely want to stop the wrong doing that other vampires were responsible for.  Besides, Momo shouldn't judge her so harshly.  She had almost been turned into a vampire herself.  She had been lucky to only have acquired an aversion to sunlight.

         “When I was sixteen I went to one after being conned by some of my friends. Sadly, they weren’t very good friends. They set me up. They walked me all the way to the door before pushing me in and feeding me to a monster,” Mina said, her eyes distant. “From then on I worked in the underground, selling my blood for money I never got to touch. Then one day my master was offered a really good deal on me. So he sold me and then not long after I was turned into one of them.”

         “Oh...”

         Momo felt bad for even asking. She had learned about the human trafficking the vampires were in control of. It was very much like the world of selling , only they offered blood as well.

         “It’s okay,” Mina said, forcing a smile to her lips. “It’s all in the past. I’m not traumatized or anything. Just regretful that I was such a stupid teenager. Sure, others turn out much worse than me. But what can you do?” She shrugged her shoulder and opened one of the drawers of the entertainment center. “Holy … that’s a lot of .” She pulled out a DVD and flipped it over to read the back cover. “I don’t think I’ve seen this one. Wanna watch?” She waggled her eyebrows at Momo, causing the other girl to let out an involuntary laugh. “Well, what else are we going to do to pass the time? Look, she’s a sailor scout! How can we not watch this?”

         “Don’t tell me the guy is Tuxedo Mask...”

         “We’ll have to watch and find out,” Mina said as she opened the case.

         Momo just shook her head, at a complete loss for words.

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A/N: Wow, I managed a second update this month, I'm very surprised.  Next chapter should feature Sana once again!  Maybe... Hmm, don't know yet.