by Cat Thomson
Kylie lay back down again and looked up at the clear, star infused sky.
"'Dr Patel', 'dhampir' - what are you on about, Kylie? And who's Harper?"
"I'll explain it all to you, but not now. I'm not in the mood."
"So where's this vampire Helmut that we're identical to?"
"He was destroyed; they were all destroyed. I witnessed it. Mom was really upset that I did. These people turned up early one morning and rounded us up and kept their guns aimed at us until the whole ordeal was over. They burned down the barn where the vampires lived. And they killed Ed; shot him. Mom tried to cover my eyes so I couldn't see what was going on, but I watched between her fingers. And I heard the awful screams of the vampires as they burned."
"No way, Kylie. Who was Ed?"
"Ed was the guy whose farm we lived on. I loved it there. He was this secretive millionaire who kept quiet about his personal life. Dad told me that after he was killed, they found out that he'd made his money in drug dealing; the farm had been where he grew his narcotic plants a few years before we lived there. He had an underworld empire and was totally corrupt, and he had all these corrupt connections in government, willing to do anything for a hefty bribe. Well, not all of them were corrupt. He even organised fake ID's for everyone on the farm. But when Mom and Dad lived with him at the shelter and on the farm, he was this staid recluse who spent most of his time alone, listening to classical music and drinking expensive wine. Dad said he was one of the few humans to really understand the world threat of rising vampirism. He had wanted a full-on war against the vampires, but it never happened. The Resistance was way outnumbered by Nikolas's vampires and by his human supporters, and they had to escape from the shelter in the end. Ed never expected the number of vampires to increase so rapidly, never mind how many humans ended up on their side. He had just assumed that it would basically be a battle between Nikolas's coven and his Resistance. At the start of it all, their numbers were more or less equal."
"I hope you're not just winding me up and all this stuff you're telling me about us is BS, Kylie."
"I'm not. The problem with keeping you in the dark about the past is that you don't have a clue about who and what you are and about what really happened. It's a long story. Maybe one day we could try to get Dad out on his own so he can tell you everything that happened."
"But when it comes to vampires, at least we don't need to worry about them now; they've all been eradicated," said Stephanie.
"That's what you think."
"What do you mean?"
"I was raised until the age of about five by Nikolas, the leader of the vampire army; then Helmut and another vampire - Charlotte - came and stole me away from him. And I-"
"You really are winding me up, Kylie. You were raised by Nikolas? The Nikolas?! The one we learn about in History?"
"Just listen, Stephanie. I'm telling you the truth. Ask Dad. The thing is, I saw Nikolas around the time that the leaders of the rebel countries announced that the vampire threat was over."
"But they destroyed him when they bombed his hideout on Hampstead Heath in London. Everybody knows that," said Stephanie.
"They didn't destroy him," said Kylie.
"Yes they did!"
"No. I saw him one night at the farm; I sensed I was being watched and when I looked out into the shadows I saw him. He put a finger to his lips and smiled at me. I never told anyone, not until now. Oh my God, Stephanie, I realise now that that was a huge mistake. But when he put his finger to his lips and smiled, I felt as though I was colluding with him in some game. I was just a child.
"I'm sure Nikolas is still out there; he's just biding his time. It's funny, but I think I still love him even though I know he's evil. He was very kind to me when I lived in his coven. Dad thinks that Nikolas never harmed me because my unusual eyes had an effect on him, as though I somehow mesmerised him, and that the antidote also may have had some kind of subtle effect on him. I'm not sure if that's possible, though, my mesmerising Nikolas. I was just a human child really, at the end of the day."
***
Stephanie became quiet as she absorbed everything Kylie had just told her. As the two of them lay on the fine, white sand listening to the gentle crashing of the waves just beyond them, Kylie closed her eyes and forced herself to recall the awful memory of the morning after the idyllic party at the farm, when those callous bastards had turned up and set the barn alight...
Charlotte shed red-stained tears. She knew she wouldn't open her eyes to another night. As her eyes locked with those of James, who lay alongside her, she saw that he also knew that this was their inevitable fate. In the pre-dawn stillness they had both sensed the approaching group of hostile humans, still some distance from the farm, but drawing nearer.
Their human mates Martin and Katie weren't with them. They had just left to take Mark and Gareth to the train station, and when they returned from dropping them off, they intended to sleep in the main farmhouse. Otherwise, they would disturb the unconscious vampires by allowing light to penetrate the interior of the barn when they entered it.
James took Charlotte's hand in his and they looked around them in their last minutes on Earth and saw that all the vampires present had sensed what was to come. Helmut nodded his farewell to James and Charlotte. There would not be time to go out in search of another - safer - resting place. The sunrise was imminent, its faint glimmer already apparent in the sky.
"Go! I beg you!"
Brian's lover Aria tried desperately to persuade him to take refuge in the farmhouse, but he refused to leave her. He watched the vampires lying supine on the dry straw as they became instantaneously oblivious of the world around them at daybreak. As he lay awake in their midst, he heard the sound of the arriving vehicles and the chaotic shouting that ensued once the vehicles' engines had been turned off.
"But they are not like the others!" Ed yelled beyond the confines of the barn.
Then there was vicious laughter, followed by a gunshot and the screams of a woman. Brian realised that the woman was Katie; she must have just got back to the farm after having dropped the guys off at the station. Moments later, smoke seeped into the barn as fire began to consume its wooden exterior. As the fire crept further and further inward, its flames licked the lifeless bodies of the undead, and they opened their eyes, automaton-like, and screamed shrilly as their bodies rose towards the ceiling in a futile reflex attempt to stave off the flames.
Katie wailed mournfully outside as Brian resigned himself to the unbearable, sweltering heat. He kissed his lover's cheek and closed his eyes. The flames were now fast encroaching and, with them, his imminent death.
But he had tasted the nectar of vampire lust and could no longer imagine life without it.
***
Undisclosed location in countryside
Tuesday, 5 December 2045
Sunrise: 07:51
Sunset: 15:43
Nikolas's hands exploring Katie's skin evoked satin brushing luxuriously over marble, and her body soon responded to his touch. As Katie entwined her fingers in Nikolas's long black hair, her body quivered with the delectable shock of his icy penetration. He had not yet fed tonight.
Only moments before, Nikolas had suddenly appeared in front of Katie, and she had regretted the incredible stupidity of leaving the farmhouse in the middle of the night to go out walking alone in the fields. Jay had constantly warned her against such reckless actions, but her dark and mournful memories of her lost love James had left her feeling restless and claustrophobic and unable to sleep tonight. Katie had tried to run from Nikolas, but he had obstructed her escape.
"Why run from what you most desire, Katie?"
The tone of Nikolas's words alone had been enough to hold her spellbound. She had removed her clothes unbidden and lain down on the muddy earth, oblivious of the bitingly cold night air as the lust she had felt for Nikolas on the night that James had made her a dhampir, resurfaced.
And now, as Katie lay on the damp ground
, willingly submitting to her annihilated mate's arch-enemy, his pointed canines made their inevitable way to her neck. How long since she had experienced such bliss! Nikolas drank until he was fully satiated, but even then he continued to imbibe of Katie's vitality, transporting her along with him into the murky depths of his decadence. She imagined in the midst of her elation that she could hear the beating of her heart slow down.
And then she lost consciousness.
"Isn't it sad, how your beloved James ended up nothing more than a pile of dust in a barn," Nikolas said to the unconscious Katie as he rose from the ground. He stood watching her. "Just think; if I hadn't been out of London searching for my little human Elizabeth, then I would have met a similar fate on the Heath when the rebel human nations bombed my coven. I'm not the only vampire survivor - Victor's mate Renata, for one, survived in Paris. We've been in contact on the Dark Web.
"Fortunately for me, you fools were lulled into a sense of security by the news that we vampires had been vanquished. When I learnt that you and Martin would be taking your friends to the station on the morning of the fire, well, what better opportunity than that to get my humans to destroy your precious James, and all those other sordid vampires with him. But it was really quite a bonus that most of Ed's feisty little crew had moved on over the previous few days, otherwise my humans may not have succeeded in burning the barn down.
Nikolas smiled.
"I wonder where Dr Patel went after he left the farm," he continued. "He put a fantastical effort into saving humanity from me, but I believe the antidote was a fluke discovery. Still, if the rebel armies hadn't turned up when they did, thereby ending the advancement of the antidote's dissemination, then in time our favourite food source would undoubtedly have become unpalatable to us vampires. And a vampire's existence without the pleasures of human flesh is pointless.
"Whenever I encounter antidote-tainted humans, I get my groupies to eliminate them. We simply can't allow anyone tainted with the antidote to survive. It's a wonderful thing, beloved, that you were a dhampir at the time that it was being administered, otherwise I'd consider you to also be tainted. And then I'd be obliged to destroy you as well. It's really quite distressing at times, realising the extent to which the antidote has spread.
"You must have seen my human groupies - they have a thing for wearing black T-shirts bearing the silhouetted white image of my enigmatic face. It's a rebellious fashion statement for them. Isn't it interesting, how I've taken on a mythic status, Katie? There are groups of humans scattered across the globe now who've pledged allegiance to me; they believe I'm still around and they actually want me to rule the planet. My plan may have failed the first time round, but I now know where I went wrong. For one thing, I neglected the independently-minded countries; took it for granted that they would leave us to our own devices until we'd managed to infiltrate their governments.
"But you don't need to hear all of this, beloved. I'm only sharing it with you now because you're unconscious. Since I lost Michael, I've had to keep my innermost thoughts to myself. Ah, if I ever come across the Slayer who annihilated him, I'll rip his head off."
When Katie's slightly parted lips were beginning to turn a shade of blue, Nikolas knelt beside her and cut into his wrist with one of his sharp nails. The waning crescent of the moon in the dark sky was their only witness as Nikolas held his bleeding wrist just above Katie's mouth and watched as red droplets fell between her lips and her body began to rouse itself from its moribund state at the taste of his eternal nectar.
Katie's soulless eyes suddenly sprang open as she grabbed hold of his wrist and drank greedily. Nikolas watched waves of brunette hair slither outwards from her scalp to replace her no longer full-bodied, dyed human hair. When he saw that her skin was becoming youthfully smooth, he smiled. Katie's short spell as a dhampir had ultimately been to Nikolas's advantage - James's vampire imprint on her when he had made her a dhampir meant that the ageing she had undergone over the years was now being reversed as she transformed into a vampire. This reversal hadn't been guaranteed to happen and had it not happened, Nikolas would have annihilated her now, as he watched her transform, without a moment's hesitation.
"And now I'm making you mine, Katie," Nikolas said as he leant towards her to kiss her forehead, "just as I intended from the moment I first saw you."
***
Part 6: Epilogue
The music flowing out of her earpieces blocked out all other sounds as Kylie ran down the stairs and into the kitchen. She only had an hour or so to wait until Mom served dinner, but she couldn't wait. She was feeling peckish and wanted to make a snack.
She stopped short the moment she entered the kitchen: on a plate on the counter top were the raw portions of steak they would be having for dinner. She could feel her heart pounding as she approached the plate. She took hold of a succulent steak, her furtive body language revealing the hint of guilt she felt about her intention.
Her music was too loud for her to hear her mother scream when she walked into the kitchen and discovered Kylie ripping off chunks of raw, red meat, her eyes closed as she savoured its bloody taste, as though she were a ravenous wild animal. She was oblivious of her mother's presence in the kitchen, and of her father and sister's eyes on her - they had come running into the kitchen when they had heard her mother scream.
When Kylie eventually opened her eyes, she was confronted by the emotionally-charged faces of her family - her father and mother's expressions were a mixture of disgust and fear; her sister's was one of awe and bewilderment. Kylie laughed with abandon, and her mother noticed that her canines had grown yet further in sharpness and length. When Kylie saw her mother look at her other daughter Stephanie, standing alongside her, she understood what her mother was thinking: she was afraid that the same thing would happen to Stephanie in time.
Kylie flung the small remnant of steak down on the kitchen counter and strode out of the kitchen and up the stairs. Once back in her bedroom, she closed and locked the door, but not long after, she heard someone knocking on it.
"What do you want?" she called out.
"It's only me," Stephanie said in response.
Kylie opened the door and her sister slipped into the room. She locked the door again and returned to the backpack on the bed that she had already begun to fill with some of her things during the few minutes she had been back in her room.
"What are you doing, Kylie?"
"I'm leaving," said Kylie.
"But why?"
"I don't belong here."
"Take me with you!"
"No, you're too young."
"Please!" Stephanie threw herself down onto the floor and took hold of Kylie's leg in a tight, desperate grip.
"What the fuck are you doing! Let go of me!" said Kylie.
"I don't belong here either, Kylie. Take me with you. We're different. I can't live here without you, and if you go without me, I'll just leave on my own."
Kylie knew intuitively that her sister was speaking the truth: that she would leave the family home on her own if Kylie didn't take her with her. But Stephanie was very young and would be vulnerable on her own out there.
"Alright, get your things. You have fifteen minutes. If you're not ready, I'm leaving without you," said Kylie as she stood on her bed to take the crucifix down from where it was hung above the headboard. "And make sure you also bring yours," she said to Stephanie as she brandished her crucifix.
Stephanie unhesitatingly got up from the floor and disappeared out of Kylie's bedroom.
***
They had heard their mother and father shouting in the living room as they had crept down the stairs.
"They're not normal, Tom. They're evil," they had heard their mother saying. She was crying. "Did you see her canines? And look at how her hair's gone from being curly and gold-blonde like yours when she was little to being as white and dead straight as Helmut's. The same thing happened to Stephanie, and she's starting to change in other ways too. You would t
hink they were twins, the way each of them in their own time has grown to look more and more like Helmut. None of the children with the James antidote were defective. Why did this nightmare have to afflict our children?"
"I agree with you, Sharon; she has become more and more like Helmut, and it looks like Stephanie's on the same path," their father had replied. "But you've got to calm down. It was pretty weird to witness what we just did, but maybe we're overreacting to it. It's not as if we walked in on our daughter with her teeth embedded in the neighbour's thrashing cat."
"No, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's only a matter of time before a truly grotesque thing like that actually happens. She's transforming into something creepily non-human."
"She's a hybrid, as Dr Patel explained to us," said Tom. "Helmut spent a lot of time with Kylie and he told me once that he had observed some unusual change in her, and that he suspected that as the years went by, she would increasingly develop vampire traits. But he felt certain she would always be intrinsically human. And the same goes for Stephanie. Look, Sharon, at least they tolerate crucifixes."
***
Their parents were oblivious of the front door clicking shut behind Kylie and Stephanie as they had run off down the street in the direction of the train station. Kylie and Stephanie had taken money from the kitchen jar and had used some of it to buy one-way train tickets to London, where they were now walking down an inner city street. It was late and Kylie wondered where they would spend the night. They knew no one in the city; their parents had made a point of avoiding London and the two sisters had never even been there before.
