Blood & Juniper

Ash looks back at the wall the Specter disappeared into as we wander away from the scene of the fight.

"So, you're sure your OK? You don't have to act so tough," Ash laments.

"I'm really fine. I wish I could have prevented her from laying a hand on you at all. I'm sorry."

I'm glad she wasn't seriously hurt during the commotion. I was so adrenaline fueled I didn't have time to process it but that was pretty stressful trying to keep Ash from getting too battered up.

"No," she says abruptly, "No, you're not apologizing for my dumbass. I should be thanking you, so thank you. I would have been so screwed," her eyes close tight as her face pinches up like she's s.u.c.k.i.n.g on a lemon, she should stop that, it's making *me* feel bad, "I wasn't trying to provoke anyone… I should have listened, I feel terrible that I got you hurt."

"It is what it is," I shrug, I'm not angry, just relieved we're alive, "I've had worse injuries and fights. I'd take a little cut over your life any day."

If it came down to it, how much would I sacrifice for her?

She shakes her head, "You shouldn't have to."

"I'm sure you'll use more discretion next time," I smirk at her.

She gives me a tight lipped smile back that doesn't reach her eyes, "Yeah, I'll be more careful."

We walk silently, she looks back to study the vanishing act wall again.

"So, you won't tell me the rest?" she breaks the silence with her question.

"Hmm?"

"When you died saving the girl."

"Not much to tell, but I didn't save the girl," I wrinkle my nose, trying to a good Samaritan completely backfired, "She likely lost too much blood, I woke up next to her cold and lifeless corpse," I pause as disgust washes over, "I couldn't stop myself from drinking what was left of her."

"But… But," Ashlen gawks, "She was already dead, wasn't she?"

"Yep, and I descended on her like a vulture."

"...So we can drink from corpses?"

I eye her up and down, there's no judgment in her face, she's not disgusted with my weakness. Her face is curious and candid as she waits for an answer. She always surprises me.

"Kind of, but the blood goes rotten after a while and it's not just blood we crave it's the life force as well."

She tilts her head with a lift of her eyebrows as I explain further, "You see, we could drink blood from hospital vials and the taste would be there, it might even sate you for a bit but there's something missing in that and you'd notice it immediately."

"What's missing?"

"Life, that beating heart that makes blood more than just a stagnant puddle. You hunger for a life force too and that's why drinking from a healthy human being is not only crucial, it's also," I frown, "so addictive."

A man walks by us, I'm glued to the pulse on his neck as his fragrance taints the air. All this talk of blood is making me aware of how much I need it. People begin to spawn at random as Ash and I trudge into the heart of New Corvis. Maybe I should have Ash wait here so I can slip away for a second.

I stare down at the short woman trotting at my side, her ponytail sways as she bounces along. Ash's gaze fixed on the grimy hand I have shoved in my jacket. She's staring at it like a single black dot on a perfectly white wall.

She opens her mouth to ask something else, "And what happened before you died, how did you get mixed up in everything?"

"You want to know the whole story?"

"Yeah, we've got a while before we get there, right? I'm interested, give me all the details."

"It's really not that amazing. I found a girl being attacked, got attacked myself, died and was resurrected as a monster. See, not much to it."

She scoffs, "Come on, Sam. Don't be like that, I want to know! What's the harm in telling me?"

She gives me a look that says she won't drop it until I give her the whole scoop. 'Fine, Ash, you win this time.' She notices my giving in with a roll of my eyes and a giddiness crawls over her.

"I grew up in a town near Seattle, lived there for the entirety of my human life. There was an abandoned construction site that I'd walk through occasionally, they just left the equipment untouched in a heaping mess for some time."

"That doesn't sound safe, wouldn't something like that be blocked off?"

I snort, "It was my short cut. Things weren't so regulated and controlled back then."

She teases with a cheeky grin, "Oh back then, huh? Things were in black and white back then, right? What year was it again?"

Very funny, Ash. She's still trying to figure out how long I've been around.

"Anyway," I glare at her, giving a sideways smirk, "I would check out the place on my way home from time to time. Well, that night I heard something, someone in trouble," Her ears perk up as we continue walking, "The place was typically empty, thought someone might have hurt themselves by falling in a ditch or unstable equipment fell on top of them."

"And you found the girl."

I frown with a nod, "Yes, I found the girl. She looked a little younger than me, tightly curled hair, same color as yours," she makes a frightened face as I draw a single similarly, "A tall man was holding her, anywhere else I would have suspected them to be lovers. Not here in this dangerous place, just underneath a deteriorating, rickety structure. I knew something was wrong."

My brows knit together, remembering it as clear as yesterday, though I hadn't thought about this for a long time.

Ash's big eyes draw me back as she whispers, "Then what happened?"

"I called out to them and next thing I know the man is speaking to me, he never let go of her but I was hooked into his gaze," I shake my head glowering, his glowing dark blue eyes burned into my skull, I recite what he said to me, " 'There is nothing out of the ordinary here, you should get home, it's getting late.' Those were his exact words."

"But you knew he was lying, there's nothing normal about people making out in an area that requires a tetanus shot."

A short, humorless laugh escapes me, "He wasn't just lying, Ash. He was persuading me and I almost bought it."

She looks at me in confusion before her face lights up, "Oh, you mean that hypnotism thing you do!"

I nod as I weave around a delectable couple walking opposite of us, "All my suspicions were melting away and I felt stupid for suspecting trouble in the first place. I began to walk away from them, trying to write the last nagging bits off as paranoia. I wouldn't. I wondered if I was going insane but deep down I think I knew and I fought against what he put into my head as 'good judgment'."

I stare at her for a moment and she ushers me to continue with a bounce of her head.

"My thoughts were fighting me, betraying me but I marched back into that trench. I didn't know what was real but I stuck with what actually ended up being the truth," I sigh, "I mean, my gut was right but it was also the thing that got me killed."

"I remember how shocked he looked that I resisted his persuasion and then how that look distorted into something absolutely evil. I remember the girl's back was arched over so immensely that blood poured over her face and into her hair. And then he dropped her," we had stopped walking and I realized I was staring into a puddle like a mirror, reflecting all past and present back at me, "I don't think I knew what true fear was until that moment, his eyes were stabbing I into my head, he commanded me not to move and I couldn't."

"But you broke free from his 'persuasion' the first time, didn't you do it again?"

"This wasn't the same, it wasn't 'persuasion', this was 'control'. Like something was physically holding me in place. I tried to move, I was yelling at myself to move but I was stuck."

Ash gapes, "What did you do, could you even do anything?"

"I struggled trying to move, I started yelling all kinds of things at him, which typically doesn't happen with someone under an infiltrator's control but he demanded that I shut up and I obeyed."

"I felt powerless in my own skin, like something had invaded a huge chunk of my mind and taken over," I look up recalling how comparatively feeble I was to what I am now, "I think he was… Impressed with me, at the very least entertained with my resistance. He commanded I tell him what I felt and what I intended to do."

"And what did you feel?"

I couldn't help but laugh as I look away even though it isn't funny, "Completely terrified and angry," I shifted my weight, "And I told him that, even though I didn't want to. And my intentions were forced out of my throat along with it. My tone was so void of emotion, I told him if he didn't let the girl and I go, I'd fight him…and kill him."

Ash's expression probably echoed my own when I heard those words force out of my mouth all those years ago.

"I was just as shocked and appalled as you. I wasn't known for being violent, I would have never graced the idea of actually killing someone. At least, I was never consciously aware that I would."

She blinks as she straightens her face with a tilt, "I'm sure anyone would have said the same thing in your situation. You were in danger, you had to defend yourself."

I refrain from chuckling, Ashlen is far too altruistic and idealistic. Seeing the good in everyone, even when it wasn't there. Another mark of her innocence. I would have loved to believe it was my situation that made me say those things, but I fear I was never a good person to start. Those words being forced out of me were just my true colors showing through.

"So what? Did he turn you because he liked your tenacious spirit or something?" She throws out a guess.

"No," my eyebrows raise for a second before shaking my head, "I don't believe he intended to turn me, though, I think he did find something that interested him in what I said. He told me he was going to kill the girl and I, then he told me to act according to my intentions and freed me from his control."

I looked to Ash and answered the question about to fall out of her mouth, "And yes, I fought him and as you know, he overpowered me, easily, because at the time, I was no match for a vampire."

"You said he had no intention of turning you, so how did it happen?"

"Sheer dumb luck," I give a frustrated smirk, "He was on top of me, gulping down my blood by the mouthful, I was losing consciousness fast. I had stopped punching him by then because it was useless, but I didn't give up. I stretched my hands about, grabbing blindly for something to injure him with, anything."

"I got my hands on something solid, metal. I didn't know what it was but by the sound and weight I think it was a massive chain. It didn't give at first so I yanked again and again with every ounce of strength I had left," I shrug casually remembering the next bit, the gesture is a tad facetious, "Well, I somehow got it loose and whatever it was brought the whole flimsy structure down on top of us."

Her jaw drops, "Did… Did you kill him? How did you survive!"

Her passion and concern touches me and also makes me chuckle. I obviously got out of there in one piece, more or less, "It didn't kill him but he didn't react quick enough to completely avoid the avalanche. Cement pieces and metal rods raining at enough velocity to even cut through a vampire's skin."

She gulps with a grimace, I reassure her, "Don't worry, it happened so fast, I was knocked out pretty quickly. And when I woke up, I under a pile of rubble, he was gone and the girl's corpse was on the floor."

"Gone? Just gone? And you were a vampire? There's no way you could have survived otherwise."

"Yep and yep, he was nowhere to be found and I had been turned. I realized something was different when I pulled a giant piece of rebar out of my stomach and I was not only alive but healing. I *really* knew something was wrong when I…," I swallow as my face scrunched up, it still disgusts me, her dead eyes were so haunting, "When I found myself l.i.c.k.i.n.g up the blood of a dead girl."

A hand tenderly touches my arm, I look over to meet Ash's compassionate gaze, "It's not your fault, you didn't kill her, you know. And I don't think she really had a use for her blood at that point anyway."

I snort, those were the most bizarre words of comfort I have ever heard.

She grins, going a bit further, "At least you didn't have a stinky deer as your first. I think I had dirty fur stuck in my teeth for that whole night!"

I smirk, shaking my head with a sarcastic response, "That's lovely, Ash. Thanks for sharing."

Her lip curls as she glares at me, slugging my bad arm. That smarts, I wince before snickering, having a hole in your c.h.e.s.t sucks.

She pulls her lips to the side, muttering some questions to herself, "So does the bite of a vampire turn someone? No, that's not right, then I would have turned every person I've bitten. Do they have to die? No, that can't be..."

I interrupt her little guessing game, "In order to become a vampire you not only have to be bitten and drank from by another vampire, you also have to consume some of their blood and then die."

She looks quite stunned, "So how did you become..."

"It must have been written in the stars," I toss up a hand as if to curse the skies, "I don't know for sure but I suspect he either turned me in vengeance to make me suffer as a bastardized vampire or I ingested some of his Godforsaken blood when all that shit fell on top of us."

I stare out at a girl chattering away on her cell phone under a harsh lamp, l.u.s.ting after her deliciously rosy cheeks as I speculate, "I was covered in blood, so it's not too far fetched to assume I swallow some of his."

"Sam?"

I look over at Ash, her eyes squinting to examine me, "Hmm?"

"You're hungry."

I raise my eyebrows at her, "What makes you say that?"

She makes a face as if to chastise for insulting her intelligence, "You have been eyeing every person that has passed by us for the past five blocks, not to mention you keep staring at the girl talking on her phone over there."

Huh, I guess I had been doing that. I never knew Ash could be so observant or that I could be so aloof. It's like we switched places, "You caught me, I could go for a bite. What about you? Why do you keep staring at my pocket?"

She looks fl.u.s.tered, she happened to be staring at it again when I called her out.

"Well, I! You... You never cleaned the blood off your hand," she looks away timidly, "or your c.h.e.s.t."

"Is it bothering you?"

"It's tempting me."

"Tempting?" my eyes narrow, "This is vampire blood, Ash."

She gives me a strange look, a mix between shock, confusion and something else, her eyes thin with a pause, "Maybe I'm hungrier than I thought."

Hmmm, maybe. I study her face, she's doing that thing, again. Hiding things from me. Would she be angry if I pressed her on it?

She interrupts my thoughts, "Go find someone."

"I'm fine I can wait, but you should find someone if you're hungry."

"How about we share someone?"

"What?"

"You don't think I can handle myself?"

"It's not that, I just don't think you realize what that entails."

She hesitates with a sceptical look, "And what exactly does it *entail*?"

"Well, sharing someone can be," I smirk, "somewhat intimate."

She blinks with a mortified expression, my grin widens. I can't help myself, she's so reactionary.

"Wha- you! You're so full of it," she sputters, hiding her face from me with a turn, "There's nothing intimate about s.u.c.k.i.n.g the life out of someone!" Vampire's don't blush but Ashlen's cheeks definitely look redder than they did a minute ago.

Am I an asshole for finding her discomfort enduring? Most definitely.

"Oh, you're sure about that? You know feeding is an intense experience. Don't you think adding someone to the mix would heighten that?"

I struggle not to laugh at the face she's making.

Her lips are pinched tight, fed up with my teasing.

Then the corners of her mouth turn up suddenly as her eyes become devious. I may have taken this too far, now I'm in trouble.

"Fine, show me then," she says with a new tone putting me on the spot, "I guess I won't know until I experience it myself," she grins stepping very close, her b.r.e.a.s.ts nearly pushing against me with that sly look in her eyes, "When we get to the bar I want you to share someone with me."

Her scent crawls over me, for the life of me I'll never understand why she smells so good. She's close, I'd like to pull her much closer. I want to taste her and it unsettles me a bit, but I don't let that show. I stare right into her bright eyes and I don't move. I've never been compelled to do that before, not for this reason.

"If that's what you wish," I respond after a moment with a composed face.

I remove myself, setting course for the bar, defying the pull of her magnetic being. Perhaps she didn't want me to pull away and I've left disappointment to ferment. She can do much better than me. Ash has a bad track record for having a lousy judge of character.

She clings to the Reaper who had a ruthless reputation of slaughter without cause, rumored to cannibalize and butcher humans and vampires alike. A rotted humanity, no love in that black heart, cruel and thorny.

And then there was me, a prem.a.t.u.r.e version of it. In a few decades perhaps I'd be as hollow as the thing I hated. It was one of my many reasons for being so hell bent on destroying the Reaper. I saw myself becoming that, empty and unfeeling. I feared becoming that ugly shell of a human being, but I'm surly dragging out the unavoidable.

Ash is like a beacon of white light and I'm a parasite leeching off her good will. I'm a user and I'm selfish. She is either too naive to realize or too idealistic to see who I really am. Both of us. The reaper and I, we're monsters and Ashlen is not. She's more human than either of us could ever dream to be and humans should never care for monsters, because monsters only take and never give anything in return.