Last Memory

I'm sitting with the boys and Dingo has the shakes like a junkie with too much fixed. “Need a slurp?” Sunshine asks. He nods and they both look to me. The night has just started and we're all debating the same thing, Dingo just had to go and get worked up about it. “Lets hit the Heights. The meat is always showered this time of night,” Sunshine comments. I give it a shrug and Dingo looks too hungry to argue. We're on our way. We three vampires, we ran across the rooftops and bounded over the skyscrapers. I could hear a few people below me. They were discussing whether they had just seen me jump by. Fucking meat. We're at the Heights faster than a bird can fly and down on the third floor. It has been ages since I had a good bite myself. I pound on a door with a Welcome Mat on the front. “Flower Delivery!” I call. The door is opened moments later and Dingo is on her like a vulture. A light rap on a door several down, “Video game Delivery!” The door swings open and Sunshine hardly makes a sound. I don't even look behind my shoulder, I just keep walking down the hall. Maybe vary it up, go see another floor. I light a cigarette as I enter the stairwell and take a long drag. “You know those things can kill you,” a voice says behind me. I tense and get ready to make the concerned citizen dinner. The red haze comes over me and things get a bit fuzzy. Night comes onto night and suddenly things go darker than usual.

Sunrise

When I wake up, the sun is on my face. My first reaction is to keep my eyes closed and try to struggle, because my skin should be on fire right now. The pleasant temperature stuck around and I was having trouble moving. I hadn’t felt the sun on me in forty years. The reaction to not dying immediately because of it was mixed. When I finally took a peep, I see white walls and a window with the curtains mostly drawn. I kinda half smiled and looked down at my arms just to double check. Yup, still alive, still not minding the sun. A glance to my right explains the curious lack of panic that should be in my head with a curious bag of fluids dripping into me. Drugs hadn’t worked on me for years, but I wasn’t too concerned about it. Must be doping me with the stuff in the bag. I enjoyed sunlight & drugs being back in my life for about thirty seconds. Then the music starts. In walks this guy in a white coat with a couple of nurses and it’s all happy to see I’m doing well. They ask me how I’m feeling, if I’m hungry, will I need a bathroom break, on and on while I give them the silent treatment. There’s nothing like people asking you how you’re doing to make you wonder just what the hell they want. And then the music just starts to roar. I’m a vampire, a grade A slurper with all the trimmings, and I’m enjoying a sunny day in a hospital with drugs and doctors. I decide to assume the guy in the white coat is in charge and ask him what the fuck is going on. “Why, haven’t you realized yet? You’ve been cured! You’re not a vampire anymore,” he replies.

First Meal

The music stops and suddenly breathing sounds like gongs on a subway. The lights are blinking, or maybe I am, and suddenly all I can fixate on is the weird empty sensation in my stomach. I’m hungry. And not wanting a slurp hungry, like I haven’t had a fix in a while and I don’t care about anything else hungry. I’m irritable about it hungry. The doctor starts explaining that there might be an adjustment period as the cure takes effect and the nurse leaves to get me a glass of water. “You might be re-experiencing some biological functions that you haven’t felt in years, decades even,” he says while I start looking around a bit more. I’m not tied or restrained to the bed, which makes me feel better for about a second. I lunge forward to take the doctor hostage only to have all the blood rush to my head and all the energy drain out of me. I haven’t been weak in a long time either. The doctor takes a step back, startled, but he figures out the score pretty fast. “Now, I realize you might not exactly have been expecting this. Our operatives tagged you just before you could take another innocent life. We came upon you quite on accident, Mr. Shade.” I’m all ears as I lay back in bed trying to figure out which the way room isn’t spinning. A knock on the door and the nurse comes back in, a glass of water and a covered dish. “Before we talk more, we’re going to need to get you adjusted back to being human. Perhaps something to eat, something you’re used to?” He pulls back the cover and there’s a barely cooked steak on the plate. For a second I think he’s making a joke.

Days Go By

And it turns out the joke is on me, because I choke the thing down. The doctor gives me a pat on the back and leaves the room. Days go by like this. Eating turned out to be one of the easier things to get re-adjusted to. When you’re a blood sucker a lot of basic issues go out the window. Taking a crap, for instance. Would you believe I actually forgot how to wipe my own ass? Just never came up after I quit ingesting solids. I complained about headaches for days before I realized drinking water was all I needed to do. I’d been a vampire for about forty years, got tagged in the sixties when things were a bit looser. Thirty years is just enough time to forget what it’s like to have to do the little stuff. The place they were keeping me was some kind of hospital, but there seemed to be only one other patient. Whoever it was, they kept them behind locked doors and told me to stay out. Otherwise, I had free reign around the joint but would get stopped at the front door. It was weird, like they weren’t equipped to have a person like me around. They certainly weren’t pumped about a former vampire being there either. One nurse actually covered up her neck when I walked by. I could’ve ripped the joint apart, had a feast and…well, I could’ve done all that back when I was a vampire. Plus I was a lot weaker, not quite mortal, but still weak by my standards. No one really wanted to talk to me and when I asked what was going on they just said the doctor had ordered me to rest. There were also orderlies in case that answer wasn’t good enough.

Where I'm At

The couple of nurses and orderlies I see start loosening up after a while. Mostly because I’m around all the time but I don’t think I was going to be invited for tea anytime soon. The mystery patient is still behind locked doors and I’m still getting stonewalled for even looking at the door. Still, people start to talk after they get used to you. I’d kinda forgotten about how to do that, make friends. You get so used to being around the same, non-aging folks that you just kinda quit bothering to meet new people. That or you kill them after a good slurp. I find out the place I’m staying is run by some sort of Secret Church Organization. They all call themselves the Paladins of the Light. What a dumbass name, right? When one of the orderlies was first explaining it to me, he was kinda gloating and showing me these weird tattoos they all have on their arms. I told him I’d been sucking blood for thirty years and never heard of them in my un-life. He actually got upset, the schmuck. I told him I’d heard about hunters here and there but things were mostly status after the vampires started regulating themselves. He didn’t talk to me so much after that. I got the impression this was a bit of a new operation, some sort of business venture in combating the immortal vampires. Most of the people there had just started their jobs but they were all long time members of the Church. Lots of enthusiasm, not much experience. They always wanted to know if I still wanted to suck blood. “Lady, if that was going to do anything except make me vomit now, I’d probably not bat an eye. Just because I’m used to it doesn’t mean I’m going to keep doing it,” I told one nurse who also quit talking to me. I had meant it to be reassuring. Honestly though, I thought about it a couple of times.

Mood Swings

They kept me cooped up for about three days like that. Just staring at me and letting me wander around. I smoked when one of the orderlies would bum me a cigarette but I didn’t have any cash so there wasn’t much to bargain with. I wasn’t in great shape during that time, physically or mentally. The term ‘moodswing’ comes to mind. At first I’d think everything was cool, I could do this. Then I’d start thinking about…Christ, nothing in particular. Just the hugeness of it all. The worst was when I started thinking about being a vampire though. I dunno, eating meat to stay alive is one thing, but it’s tough to keep that in mind once you’re human again. The justification of it all, once it stops being applicable, things get un-calm. When I was a vampire killing people didn’t really feel like killing…people. I mean, if it had been a vampire I had to slurp, yeah I might’ve gotten choked up before. That was one of my own. That was another immortal being like me. We had eternal life, that’s a helluva thing to rob someone of. That was a dude whose friends, whose family, really expected them to be around forever. Not that I didn’t kill a couple, but I thought about it afterwards. But being human again? Shit man, I’d slurped so many it’d be fair to say I was beyond redemption. I didn’t have to deal with that too much though, it’s not like I could even remember most of the people I’d killed. I tended to black out just before I made the kill, just like I did before I woke up in this goofy hospital. It was a joke that my other immortal friends used to love, that I could never remember sucking blood. They made some good gags out of it, Sunshine and Dingo. Friends forever. Well, that might be different now too.

The Thickening

It shouldn’t be much of a surprise that after a few more days of this screwing around that I decided the suspense would be a lot better if it killed me. Don’t get me wrong, being human again was swell, but it just wasn’t my cup of tea. Something about being mortal just took all the motivation out of me. I figured that if I had to die again there wasn’t much point in putting it off. I smoked a cigarette, looped a noose around my neck, and was about two seconds from knocking the chair from under me when the doctor waltzes in. Behind him is a real knock-out, one of the best looking blondes I’d ever seen. She didn’t even gasp when she saw me on the stool, ready to knock it loose. She just kept her stone face while the doctor rushed over and dragged me down. I heard him assure her that I had been very stable mentally up to this point. I told them I was the only stable person in the room and to let me back on the stool. The blonde gets real close to my face and sniffs me. After a second I realize she’s not enjoying a fetish, that she is actually smelling me. The doctor keeps me pinned still but I’m frozen solid and staring straight at her. “Ah, now I can smell the fear. Let him up. Mr. Shade, it’s time you found out you just why precisely you’re not dead yet,” she gives me a toothy grin but I stay stone faced. What the Hell is a werewolf doing here?

Interviews

They lead me to another room with a table and some chairs. I’m just about to start thinking an interrogation is going down when the doc hands me a slip of paper and the first question on it is for my social security number. “They weren’t kidding when they said this place was new,” I mutter as I sit down and look over the questions. Hometown? Last place of residence? What the fuck was this supposed to be? I must’ve been staring too long because the doctor patiently pulls the paper away, pulls out a pen, and directs my attention to the lovely she-wolf. “Tell me, Mr. Shade, what do you think of the Paladins of Light?” she asked. I tell her I think the name is lousy and ask for a cigarette. To my surprise, she obliges me. The doctor tries out a couple of the resume questions on me instead. “Are you from America, Mr. Shade?” I tell him to write Eastern Transylvania and he’s about to start when I cut him off with a snort. “I’m from Hemingway, South Carolina. It’s about as bumble fuck a town as it gets man,” I explain. “I haven’t been there in decades. It’s just easier to keep the slurps quiet and easy in a bigger city,” I add. The doctor looks at me blankly and I have to explain that it’s slang for murdering a person by sucking out their life force. They all get quiet on that one, but I’m not sure why the she-wolf was so bothered. Her eyes bulged a bit because she keeps that cool face. The more I look at her though, the more I start to notice that she’s a bit too small. A bit too passive for a werewolf, not enough aggression. “I must say, we’re all very pleased with your attitude so far. Most of the other vampires wanted to go out fighting when they realized they’d been cured. It’s nice that you’re a bit more…weak,” she says darkly.

Religous Differences

“I didn’t know dogs could handle subtlety,” I shoot back. That checks her attitude a bit, but I just played my only ace on a whim. She knows I know. “If you’re referring to Ms. Ferris’ former condition, I would appreciate it if the two of you put your differences aside,” the doctor explains. I glance at him and contemplate actually learning his name, just so I can know who to call an idiot. Werewolves and vampires had never been in the habit of getting along, to put it lightly. Ten thousand years of rape, murder, and slavery on both sides left us enemies by default. And that was back during the good days. “I’ve been around long enough to know she’s not my biggest fan. I got pricked up back in the sixties during the Vampire Enlightenment, so all the zealot nonsense never got stuffed into my head. I don’t have a problem with werewolves if she doesn’t have a problem with me. But I’m not your mortal pal either. I don’t get any more worked up about the people I killed than you do over the cows you butcher for dinner,” I explain dryly. The doctor is still as unphased as ever, but Ferris rolls her eyes. “What is a vampire doing living on the streets with two other hoods? Your whole Enlightenment sect went corporate a decade ago. What’s wrong, they got you working up the job ladder?” I take a long drag on my cigarette and contemplate the cards she’s laid down herself. “I deserted. Got sick of their bullshit. The religious folks, the Nod-worshippers, they tell themselves they have a right to kill people because vampires are chosen by the Gods. Supreme beings and all that. The Enlightenment shuffled all that up by isolating the virus that merges with us and really figuring out what the fuck was going on instead of that magic mumbo jumbo. Thing is, they just say we’re the supreme beings because the virus makes us genetically superior. Same bullshit to justify the same thing: staying alive,” I finish my speech and stub out my cigarette. Ferris offers me another and I accept. “So what do you believe justifies your actions to stay alive, Mr. Shade?” she asks. “I never really needed one until now,” I reply.

Friends from Work

The Doc asks me what I mean and I remind him that I was about to do the Hangman shuffle when he interrupted me. “Death wasn’t exactly inevitable before now,” I explain. My eyes catch the Doc checking a box next to ‘Depressed’ and ‘Suicidal’ like it might be relevant and I wait for the conversation to resume. It doesn’t, the Doc just keeps filling stuff out. “So…you used to be a werewolf? How’d they cure you? Hell, how’d they cure me? The virus mutates so rapidly I had thought it could adapt to everything but a sunny breakfast,” I ask. They eye one another and the doctor keeps writing. “Alright, scratch the last question. How’d they cure you? Lycanthropy is a bacteria that grows in the lower intestine and is spread through the bloodstream. Did they invent some su-“ Her hand moves far stronger than it looks like it can and knocks me clean to the floor. Looks like I said the right thing. “The blood of Fenrir may not be sacred to you but it is still better than your own disease. You may disdain your own religion all that you like, but kindly keep mine out of it,” Ferris says coldly. Looks like I found Ferris’ number and called it wrong. Damn but she could pack a wallop, cured or not. “If you intend to remain in our service for much longer, then I ORDER you to control yourself, Ms. Ferris!” the Doc shouts. He then turns around and helps me out, handing me a pen while he goes back to the desk. “The way we cured you will be revealed depending on you, Mr. Shade. Whether you believe in the cure or not is of little concern,” he explains. The Doc hands me the forms he has been filling out and points to a signature at the bottom. It says job application at the top.

Employed

“In exchange for agreeing to work for us, we will provide you with a place to live and a reasonable income to provide for yourself. You’ll be expected to reside in the city, keep regular hours, and be available at all times. Think of yourself as…an extra hand for the Paladins of Light. Someone who can inform us and explain things,” the Doc explains. I almost ask him what’s to keep me from running off before I remember the noose still coiled back in my room. It’s not like I have anywhere to run. “You want me to sell out my own people?” I ask. “You already said you were apathetic towards any philosophical considerations concerning humanity. You’re cured, Mr. Shade. They aren’t your people anymore. What else were you going to do?,” the Doc replies. It’s not like I have anyone to go to either. I can’t even imagine what Sunshine or Dingo would say if they met me as a human. “What’s to keep me from just getting bitten again and going back to it all?” Ferris snorts and pulls out a cigarette for herself on that one. “You’ll find that you are no longer a viable host for the virus, Mr. Shade. I’m afraid the cure is permanent. You’ll understand that soon enough or maybe not, depending,” the Doc answers. A part of me wants to ask what they plan for me to depend on. What the big deal is. But that cold feeling in my stomach isn’t just nausea at needing to eat, it’s real fear. It’s the real idea of choosing between the noose and trying to carve out a living. Trying to be human. I sign the form and hand it back without another word.

Handshakes

After that it’s all smiles and cigarette smoke as we all get up. The Doc sticks out his hand to shake but I only look at him like he just wiped his ass with it. He sighs. “As you may be noticing Mr. Shade, we’re a very young organization. We’ve only just acquired the means to combat the vampire problem. As you yourself noted, the virus is very powerful and can adapt to almost anything. Except sunlight, naturally,” He motions to the door as he talks and I go out first. In two minutes we’re down the stairs, out the lobby, and going out the doors I was blocked from leaving for the past few days. The light blinds me a little but I get over it quick enough. A glance around reveals I’m in a courtyard with a few other buildings connected by pavement. They even put a fountain and garden into their budget. “Didn’t know landscape decorators liked fighting the forces of darkness,” I mutter. Ferris cracks a bit and gives a laugh as we walk towards another building. “Just out of curiosity, are we exclusively fighting vampires or is this an equal opportunity kill job?” I ask. The Doc looks troubled for a moment and I make a motion to the former-werewolf with great tits. “Ah, I see. Well, that happens to be the source of some dispute within the Paladins of Light. Considering the current…social situation between the two factions, we have decided it best to…,” he’s getting nervous as Ferris loses the smile and gives me a stony look. What the Doc is referring to is the fact that the Guild of Nod, the dominant church of Vampirism, decided to enslave werewolves a few decades ago. Some shit in their Bible, I never read the thing and most of the other Enlightened wanted nothing to do with the werewolves. Kidnapped some important people or something that made the werewolves start working for them. I don’t get much of werewolf culture because, quite frankly, it never came up while I was a vampire. Judging by this little revelation though, apparently they aren’t too excited about being enslaved.

The Cure

Rather than finish his sentence the Doc just goes ahead and we enter another building. From the moment I step inside it smells like lab. Sterilized equipment, white walls, and rubber stench are everywhere. My nose wrinkles and Ferris puts her hand up to block the smell. If she still has some of her enhanced abilities from the lycanthropy infection, it starts to make me wonder what I might still have as well. Either way, the dull ache in my eyes tells me that the sun still isn’t doing me any favors. The Doc slides his card through a few locks and waves to some nurses as they walk by. They both step around Ferris and I like we’re made of lava. “We here at the Paladins of Light employ a variety of former police and military officers. Many have combat training and are experts with fire arms. Believe it or not, most of them end up finding us as they search for answers to their own investigations,” the Doc explains. Given the number of people I’ve sucked dry and dumped in rivers, I believe him. We get to wherever we’re going and suddenly the whole scene changes. Sterile lighting, men in body armor (with steel neck shields), and what look like heavy machine guns are suddenly all around us. I almost think about telling the Doc there is no way I’m wearing something like that when a guard grabs me and searches me. He does the same for Ferris. The Doc doesn’t get touched. We’re allowed in and proceed down a long hall that looks like hospital and feels like battle ship. “Some of our military members proposed employing more sophisticated security for this section of the facility. After all, it contains the heart and soul of our organization. Mr. Shade, allow me to present the very means of your cure!” We walk up to a double-paned glass window and inside the room I see a guy with a book waving his arms over a pile of ammo and sub-machine guns. I don’t recognize the language he’s chanting in and there are armed guards watching over him while he works. I don’t exactly know what I’m supposed to say. “Well…it fucking figures,” I reply.

The Book

“How does your science feel now?” Ferris says. I give her a half-glance and roll my eyes. I’d seen vampires grow limbs after missing them for a few days, punch through concrete walls like paper, and even the occasional glowing pair of eyes. There were explanations for it. Not necessarily great ones, but explanations all the same. “It doesn’t feel like anything. Science isn’t a belief. It’s just there,” I shoot back. After blessing the weapons in front of him, the man closes the book and places it in an engraved metal box next to him. “So you’re telling me that those weapons are blessed? As in, unlike a normal bullet, if I shoot a vampire with one of those they die?” The Doc nods but catches himself. “And they can’t regenerate the wound. Frankly, I’m as puzzled by it as you are. Nothing chemically has changed on the weapon, we checked that. And it’s also not a function of the user’s beliefs, because people who have no clue what they’re holding can still use them. The weirdest thing of all, it’s the book itself. You can’t just memorize the words to the prayers, the person has to actually be holding that book,” he says. I consider asking him how they came to all these facts but decide I don’t want to know. They’re not my people anymore. “Mind if I take a look at it?” I ask. Ferris glances at the Doc at that. “No, I’m afraid that’s not possible. That book is the source of the Paladin’s power and the greatest asset we have. Only the highest members are allowed to perform the rituals and blessings. It was a uniquely blessed weapon that cured you, by the way.” The exposition is starting to make my head hurt because of all the bullshit sirens going off. Magic spells? Holy weapons? I was expecting a medical breakthrough, not a read-along from the book mobile. I looked down at my hands and swallowed. Here I was, cured of the uncurable, and pissed off that I didn’t believe in it. How do you argue with what’s right in front of you?

The Vampire Falcon

The Doc keeps jabbering about the irrefutable proof that this book can do everything from kill vampires to part the Red Sea. It’s the source of Ferris’ cure as well, for the same unexplained reasons. “The only thing anyone can say for certain is that it might have something to do with quantum mechanics,” he finally finishes. He’s gesturing at some photo-copies of archaic diagrams and pointing at some energy x-rays. I haven’t really been listening. The Nod worshippers would’ve been all over this but…I’d always been raised that this religious crap was a bunch of nonsense. That vampires weren’t good or bad, we were just wolves living around sheep. Now some book powered by…God? The Light? Christ, what did this make me back then and in whose eyes? What did it make me now? I’m staring at the floor asking questions people should learn to not ask when Ferris gives me a light shove. “The Doctor is talking to you,” she says stiffly. “I said, Mr. Shade, have you ever heard of a Vampire Falcon?” I’m about to say I’ve also heard of the Big Bad Wolf then I catch myself. Fantasy seemed to be coming true today. “It’s a biological conundrum. Since the vampire virus mutates so rapidly, it’s the hypothetical dilemma that if you could weaken it enough or the person’s immune system was sophisticated enough, they could develop some kind of…balance with it? Resilience? Look, all of this was impossible to me up until I woke up human again,” I explain. Ferris sits down and decides to take over. “Very good, Mr. Shade. A Vampire Falcon is a half-human, half-vampire hybrid. And it is part of the reason we have brought you in and decided to hire you on the force. We have one. And we have no idea what is biologically going on with his body,” she says.

Demands

My first reaction is to tell her that I sure as hell don’t have any clue either but then I think better of it. I start remembering the whole reason I even agreed to this tour in the first place. “Well, I definitely can recognize most of the traits, maybe tell him how to develop some of the skills,” I offer. They both nod and we all look like we’re ready to go. “But if you’re going to keep referring to this gig as a job, I have some payment requests I’d like to be considered,” I add. “First, I’m going to need protection. The Guild of Nod already thought of me as a heretic but now the Enlightened are, at the very least, going to want to study me. I want a holy gun. Nothing fancy, just a pistol. Most vampires won’t be expecting it so that’d be enough. It looked like you were mass-blessing them anyways. Second, I need to get out of here. I need my own place. Third, I’ll get your Vampire Falcon up to speed but I’m not exactly fully qualified anymore. And a lot of my advice is going to involve the Falcon killing people. Once the job is done I pla-,” but Ferris cuts me off before I can finish. Honestly, I don’t even really know what I was going to say. I just felt this sudden urge to ask for stuff. “We will see for the first two. But you will learn, just as I did, the being mortal again has a lot of unexpected needs with it. You will not be able to move about as you once did. You will need to eat, stay warm, talk with people, and keep out of trouble. All of these things mean staying put. And as for the Falcon…, I’m afraid you’re somewhat mistaken about what we require from you. He is your new partner. Perhaps you’d like to meet him now?,” Ferris asks.

Introductions

We go back to the hospital wing I’d been confined in and the Doc leaves me in a chair while he goes to collect the Falcon. Ferris stays behind and sits in a chair across from me. She lights another cigarette but seems to have decided she doesn’t need to share anymore. “How did you handle it? When you found out about the book and being human again?” I ask when the silence becomes obnoxious. She pauses to take a drag before answering and I find myself again being impressed with her looks. She catches me staring and gives me a half-smile. “It was hard. It will be hard for you as well. Maybe the book is a punishment sent by the God Fenrir, maybe being human again is meant to remind me of what things should be fought for. I’ve been here for three years. I only stayed because they said they had a way to kill vampires. As long as I do that, perhaps Fenrir will forgive my people and we will be free again,” she says this like she’s got it memorized. She sure as hell hasn’t been saving it for me. I decide it’s my turn to not talk and stay quiet. It’s enough trouble to acknowledge the idea of some divine power existing at all, much less that people can read it out of a book and use it against biological invulnerability. The Doc finally comes back into the room and we both standup. Behind him, a kid that couldn’t have been much older than eighteen walks in with his hands in his pockets. His hair is dyed black and there is an earring in one of his ears. His lower lip is pierced. But none of that really phases me. It’s the crucifix around his neck that I lock onto. “Hi, my name is Jacob,” he says. He sticks out his hand and I shake it numbly. Glancing down, the enormity of the problem finally sinks in all the way. He’s wearing a ‘W.W.J.D’ bracelet.

Awkward Start

“I’m Shade. Sam Shade. You’re…you’re the half-vampire?” I ask. He scowls and jerks his hand back. They go back into his pockets and for a second I catch myself shoving my own hands into mine. “Jacob here was rescued, Mr. Shade. This has been very hard on him and he still hasn’t quite grasped the enormity of his situation. We were hoping you could help with that as well,” the Doc explains. “There’s nothing to help with. If you can cure this guy or Ferris, then there isn’t a reason you can’t cure me as well,” Jacob responds coldly. For some reason it had never occurred to me that someone wouldn’t be overjoyed at the idea of being a mutated powerhouse, but there were suddenly a couple of reasons I could see not being excited about it. If the kid was ga-ga for Jesus then there were would probably be some hang-ups. He would not, for example, be able to mutate the virus into superior strength or speed if he didn’t drink blood. He might not be forced to, if the virus in this form didn’t require it, but he was no better than the average joe without the slurp. The same went for regeneration, eyesight, hearing, and every other reason the Paladins would’ve wanted to keep this kid in this half-vampire state. And that’s when the fucking catch of this gig hits me like a ton of bricks. They want me to convince this kid to follow the lifestyle. I check out and he checks in, Vampire 101 for Jesus Freaks. And if that damn book was any indication, maybe he wasn’t totally off on his protests either. What in the hell had I just agreed to? Ferris and the Doc both look at me with almost pleading eyes, the former wolf half cocks her hips and I feel myself melting just a bit. I shouldn’t have let her catch me ogling, there’ll be trouble for it. “Kid…I think we might need to talk alone for a bit,” I explain.

Mark Twain

“Look, if you’re going to feed me some shit about saving lives and protecting the innocent, you can stuff it. I don’t want to be a vampire and I don’t care what anyone says. I’ve seen enough shit in my life to not need this crap,” the kid barks at me. I raise an eyebrow and find myself a bit impressed. The first thing religious types always seem to lack is critical thinking over authority. But this might just be knee-jerk rejection from the kid. “How…how Christian are you?” I ask. I’m a bit out of touch with the whole concept of faith and I think the look the kid shot me was a final judgment on that fact. “Gosh, I didn’t know we came in sizes. I’m a Medium-sized Christian. I got picked up by a Crisis Youth Ministry after I overdosed on meth. I believe in God and that Jesus Christ has my fucking back. Is that enough for you?” he actually pulls out the crucifix and waves it in my face. “Y’know those didn’t work on me back when I was a vampire. I don’t think anything is going to start happening now, unless you’re feeling funny,” I shoot back. He turns a bit red at that and sits down in a huff. I try a different tactic. “How bad are the pangs?” I ask. He grunts and shrugs. “Is it like being hungry but no matter what you don’t feel satisfied? Do you find yourself drinking water even when you’ve had gallons of it?” That catches his attention and he eyes me for a minute. “Is that what it is? Wanting to drink blood is what’s causing it? It reminds me of when my Mom went on that Atkins Diet thing and made me eat like her. Like I’m missing something,” he says. He fidgets with his hands for a while and doesn’t add anything after that. “Listen kid, I’m going to tell you a story that someone told me when I was first infected. You ever heard of Mark Twain? Funny guy. One time, while he was out in the desert in the Middle East, him and some pals found a line of fossilized oyster shells and fish bones in a Cliffside. One guy says they must be left over from the Great Flood, since they’re in the Holy Land. Another guy says it’s because the Earth is millions of years old and this part of the Earth used to be under water. Twain looks at both of them and just says they probably had a really popular sea food restaurant there,” I say. “The point is, any of them could be right without making the other one wrong. That’s what being a vampire is like.”

Blood Bags

“What, you mean murdering people is the same thing no matter what I call it?” Jacob asks. For a second I’m startled to hear him call it that. I don’t know why. “Some would call it murder, others would call it survival. Considering what they’re asking you to do, I can understand why you might think of it as needless. Do you…understand how big of a deal you are? You’re not possible, as far as I know. Scientifically, the vampire virus mutates so rapidly that most people who’ve studied it said the thing was uncurable. But to actually mutate, in response to an immune system, to a degree that you cut back on half the side-effects? Kid…that’s a miracle,” I explain. He seems to shrug at that, like such things are to be expected. Maybe to him they are. I’m not the one sporting a Jesus bracelet. “It’s also tough to say what exactly is going to happen once you start drinking blood. That’s how the virus grows. I think I’m still a bit stronger than the average guy but you’ll be the opposite. You’ll be punching through walls after a few years. Jumping over cars. And you don’t have to worry about sunlight at all. Jesus kid, aren’t you even the least bit excited or curious? You’re special, you’re being recruited by the Paladins of Light!” I say. He rolls his eyes and replies, “That name is really dumb. What am I supposed to do for them, anyways?” he asks. I don’t have an answer to that one but I tell him we’re probably going to be hunting vampires. “They definitely do kill people, right? And they’re all evil? Do I have to drink blood out of a person or could I just…I dunno, suck it out of a donor bag?” he seems to be perking up a bit now. People always do when you tell them about the perks that come with vampirism. “A donor bag? I guess I’ve heard of people doing it…but it’s like drinking a warm flat beer. It’s terrible, but if you don’t mind doing it then sure,” I answer.