by Lillian Grey
"You know you’re a slut for that, right?"
"Am I? Oh well, you still love me though," she said, picking up a french-fry and leaning back in her chair, smiling. So I threw one at her and she caught it, laughing.
Blood drinking foreplay...
After we left the mall, I sat at home for the rest of the day and was about to go to sleep when my phone rang, the screen blinked at me through my closed eyelids; it wasn’t a number I recognized.
"Hello?" I answered, faking a sleepy voice, hoping whoever this was would take the hint.
"Vanessa, this is Alik from Masteria; do you remember me? Sorry if I woke you." His voice was soft and creamy even on the phone.
"Yes, I remember you. I wasn’t asleep,” I said, my little acting routine vanishing, but a question in my mind sprang out. “How did you get my number?" I was stupid enough not to give it to you, I thought the last part only.
"Your friend Sam is here; I found you in her phone. She needs a way home and I don’t think a cab or her mom would be the best choices."
"Why? What’s wrong, is she okay?" All thoughts were now centered on Sam.
"She just overindulged is all; I will keep her safe until you get here."
The line clicked and I grabbed a jacket. I raced back to the place where the tent was and ran to the front opening, still in my SpongeBob pajamas. There was a different person at the door this time. Nothing like Alik, he was much more like a bad guy’s sidekick in a bad action movie.
"Umm, excuse me, but…"
"ID," he grunted in a rough voice, cutting me off.
"Shit, I think I left it at home," I said, patting my pockets.
“No ID, no entry."
"Please, Alik called me about my friend Sam..."
"No ID, no entry," he repeated, folding his arms with authority.
"Jean, it’s okay; she is a VIP here," Alik interrupted, sweeping back the opening to the tent. "Please, this way Vanessa." He gave the guard a look that made him shiver as I passed and a chill ran down my back as I passed him as well. Jean was nearly half a foot taller and twice Alik’s size, yet Alik clearly scared him and it wasn't a fear of being fired.
“I’m sorry about that, this way,” he motioned and a feeling of calm replaced the chill. We walked along the wall and I looked out at all the people dancing and wondered how many of them might be wearing Nightcaps. I actually saw one girl invite a guy over and he put his hands on her hips, going right in to bite her. She looked like she was in bliss and I could hear her giggle across the room as he sucked on her neck. "And history repeats," sighed Alik.
"Huh?"
"But these kids, biting each other like this." A sort of anger was in his low tone and my ease at which I accepted Sam enjoying this new ‘trend’ felt idiotic.
We walked up a small set of stairs hidden behind the bar where a small room sat over the crowd below. Not too far away was a small girl who must have been the DJ; she had on large headphones covering her ears and her long black hair swayed as she bounced to the beats and rhythms she was mixing live on a set of turntables with surprising speed. Alik opened the door for me and Sam was lying down on a thin black couch. The entire office space was black, silver, and glass, and the interior designer and architect in me had a brief moment until I saw Sam again.
"Sam!" I cried, running and dropping to my knees. "Is she going to be okay?" I asked as I looked at her; she was pale and her normally rich, creamy skin was now a pale milky color.
"She will be fine," he said, tossing me a small bottle from the doorway that rattled when I caught it."What’s this?"
"Vitamin B12; it will help her replace all the blood she has lost; she got a little overexcited and fainted after an exchange, that’s all."
I moved her head over and saw the marks on her neck. Two bubbles of blood congealed over the opening of two small marks, then she twitched. "Nessa, is that you?"
"Yeah Sam, it’s me. Come on, let’s get you home," I said, trying to pick her up, but Alik was at my side, he placed a hand over mine leaving behind the same tingling sensation of the night before.
"Don’t move her just yet, she should stay still for a little longer. Please take a seat at my desk while I get you a drink," Alik offered.
"Umm, thank you," I said, laying Sam back down and sitting down. His kindness was something I liked more than I should have and he returned faster than what should have been possible.
"Strawberry, I believe it's what you drank last night."
"Thank you again, really. Sam is a handful and you didn’t have to do this." How did he know what I had drank, I thought.
"Losing too much blood isn’t safe; she should watch herself. There are far worse things than boys taking advantage of an unconscious girl." A small silence followed that statement.
"Can I ask you a question?"
"You just have, but I’m guessing you have another."
"Yesterday, you mentioned that traditions follow Masteria, and you called what the teens wearing Nightcaps was doing a horrible tradition. What did you mean?" I asked and he took a long sigh.
"Well, Masteria has always been sort of a club, but it dates back to the early 1200s where any place that flew the Masteria name as I do outside has been a safe place for Night Children."
"What do you mean?"
"Masteria were always a taboo that the low born would stay away from and the high born would flock to. The low born feared the shroud the Night Children, “vampire, ghost, and ghouls” cast within the place, not that the low born could afford to be the play things of the Night Children. Unofficially, it was one of the only times that Night Children and humans tried to live together somewhat in the open in some parts of the world. Patrons of Masteria would only talk about the great sense of pleasure they felt behind the closed doors. Whether they really were bitten or molested by Night Children I do not know, as it was said that not only money passed hands but a rumored ‘exchange’ of blood or soul was paid directly to your host. Eventually, near the 1600s the Masteria were burned to the ground for being places of unholy and dark practices. However, over the years, Masteria have resurrected in places and the practice of biting or blood drinking had come with it. So history repeats and I guess it has come back to haunt me in my goal of resurrecting this cursed place."
"Haunt you?"
“As in I own this Masteria,” he seemed to be looking for a reaction from me.
"Why use the name if..."I started to say when Sam sat up.
"Nessa, I feel a little light headed, can we go home?" groaned Sam, half leaning up on her own.
"Yeah Sam, come on." I got up to help her.
"I will walk you two out," offered Alik, taking Sam in his arms and lifting her. I wanted to protest this act, because it forced me to see him touch another woman, but why would that matter to him, and Sam needed the help so I silently lead the way. He accompanied us to the opening, past all the teens who were still swaying to the music that the young girl mixed overhead. When we made it to the door, Alik whistled and Jean slid the entrance back and we walked out into the dark. He walked us to the car where I opened the door and he slid Sam in and buckled her in.
“Thank you again,” I said closing the door.
“You're welcome,” he said placing a cool hand on my arm for a brief moment, then it was gone and he was walking back towards the club.
When I drove off, I saw him walk inside in the mirror. It wasn’t until we were nearly back to Sam's place that she started to make any real sense.
"You know I think I might be anemic," she said, rubbing her eyes.
"Here, Alik gave you these. Take one a day to keep your blood levels high."
"You seem to be getting along with him rather nicely."
"He might have just saved your life, of course I’d be grateful. You’re my best friend, although I don’t know why."
"No, apart from that. You talked to him yesterday and he let you wear his very expensive Armani jacket, too."
"How do you know i
t was Armani?" I asked.
"I know designer clothes on sight when I see them; your SpongeBob pajamas aren’t very attractive."
"Damn it Sam, I was trying to ignore the fact that I didn’t change, but I didn’t know what had happened to you, but whatever." I don’t know why my cheeks blushed red; it was a good thing that it was dark. "Anyway, what are we going to do about your car? Your mom will go mental."
"I don’t know," she sighed. "I guess I can just stay at your place tonight and then we can slip out at the crack of dawn and go pick it up."
"You know, you better not pull this shit when we get to Cornell."
"I promise," she said, crossing her heart. "Scout’s Honor."
"You were never a scout."
"You know what I mean."
We pulled up to my house and her car was sitting outside with a small note on red paper with black ink. The script was rough but still fluid in its strokes. 'I thought this would simplify things for you, Vanessa. Take care of your friend. - Your friend, Alik', I read and handed the note to Sam.
"So he is a friend now?" smiled Sam. “You’re welcome.”
Alyon Alik
Chapter 04.0
The dance floor of the new club “tHE sPOT” was a horrible mix of blaring music, groping, and bad dancing. I was forced to witness teens doing drugs in the bathrooms, and hear the ecstasy of bad sex in the private booths. Everything here smelt of vulgar filth and felt colder than an Alaskan winter night, despite the sweaty people all around me. I wished to rage and curse at everyone here who made this out to be “fun”, but June’s touch on my hand focused my thoughts.
“It’s here, too,” she said in a low voice, and as I scanned the room again, I could see the various Nightcaps in use.
“Not everyone here is human; the real thing is close,” I said and we split up again to make our way around the outside of the pitiful dance floor. This was our seventh club of the night, and our first hint at an original blood drinker.
Girls gasped and boys sucked, bastardizing my culture as girls paid the exchange, whoring themselves for a mediocre thrill. Not that any of these fools knew what they were doing, I thought, as my focused slipped again just for a moment. Then I saw him. I caught June’s eye from across the room and we began to move. His teeth were at the girl’s skin before he dropped her. We had been seen and he moved for the back door quickly, not running until he made it out into the cold night air. I hated it when they ran, but June liked the chase. Quickly, we cornered him, June having circled around a few buildings overhead and cutting off his path as I forced him down a set of back alleys of my choice.
“Who is your creator?” I asked as he frantically looked around, trying to find a way out.
“As if I would tell you anything,” he spat cockily.
“You can be destroyed quickly or it can be slow. That is all dependent on how you answer my next few questions,” I said coldly, he had been responsible for this epidemic plaguing my home.
“I don’t think so.” His voice was even cockier, but now his expression matched his tone when he looked at me. Five others dropped down around us from the rooftops; three surrounded June and two others were behind me. “Now we take the city from you,” he laughed.
The first to attack me was a girl no more than seventeen. I wish I could still feel something when I killed, but I did it without a second thought. She charged blindly with her arms outstretched. I took a quick step back as she grabbed for me and when she stumbled, clutching thin air, I aimed a kick to her head that sent her crashing into one of the alley’s brick walls. With another twist, the back of my fist struck the head of another boy around nineteen, knocking him into the opposite wall where he, too, joined the girl on the floor, bleeding. Where June had once been surrounded by three, there was now just a circle of blood and the whisper of wind on steel.
“Whoa, I will talk, calm down.” All the cockiness in his voice was replaced by panic as he now begged for his life.
“Your name is Jason, isn’t it?” I asked as I walked closer.
“Yeah.”
“The law is that we pull the canines out of anyone who is caught on their first offense.” I had him by his hair and pulled his neck back as he groaned in pain. He then screamed when I pulled one of the yellowing teeth from his mouth. “That is when one feeds in the open, the law states that one who kills in the open is death. I made a promise and I am still willing to honor it, depending on what you tell me next.”
A shout came from the rooftop. “Hey,” the familiarity of the young female voice caught my attention. I looked up and was almost taken by surprise as a girl threw herself at me and I spun to dodge. The second I let go of Jason was all it took for the girl to grab a hold of Jason and flee.
“Damn it,” I said as I straightened my jacket.
“We know who their creator is now,” said June, wiping the blood from her katana’s blade on the shirt of one of the young dead.
“I wish I didn’t.”
“Alisa is just playing a game, she is a child.”
“She shouldn’t play like this with the flag of Masteria flying,” I nearly hissed in anger.
“She wants your attention,” June said as if that made this any better.
“You’re not helping,” I sighed, stretching my neck. I pulled out a small flashlight and waved it in a circle around us to clean up.
“Well, shall we catch them?” June asked, eager to chase.
“You enjoy this too much.”
“I’m a little monster, what do you expect?” She smiled showing teeth and took off, running with me close behind.
Vanessa Stanton
Chapter 05.0
My parents sent Sam and I to Hawaii for two weeks. I spent the first week sampling the local food and culture. Sam would say she did the same thing, but her idea of food was the local boys, and culture was whichever was the best way to control them. It wasn’t long before she had two of them showing us the cities and islands. With them around, our vacation became days on the beaches and nights at secret beach parties in spots that were strictly “locals only”. It was all very peaceful, probably the last extended peaceful time I would have for a very long time.
Sam had fallen asleep shortly after takeoff on the flight home. I couldn't blame her as her last night in HawaiI was a wild one. I was fine until my laptop battery died about an hour and a half out from New York and I sighed. I was forced to reached around in the back pouch on the chair in front of me and I found some headphones, which I plugged into the arm of the chair. A little TV then flashed to an old news report and as I was about to try another channel, the report caught my attention.
-Nightcaps, the newest fad to hit the New York club scene, is currently suspected to be the cause for a string of deaths that have been plaguing New York over the last month. Nightcaps are small ceramic caps placed over the canine teeth to make them sharp enough to easily penetrate the skin with the intention of injecting liquefied versions of several different drugs directly into the bloodstream while tasting and licking the wound. While others in turn have been using the act as sexual foreplay, the taste of the blood they claim acts as an aphrodisiac, heightening the sexual experience. Eight deaths, five male and three female, all ranging from ages 18-22, have been reported in several different club locations around New York. In every case, two puncture marks have been found on either the neck or inner thigh with the victim drained of enough blood to cause exsanguination. No evidence has been found at any crime scene to indicate anyone else was ever with the victims: no footprints, fingerprints, or biological evidence has been found, which is the most baffling aspect of the situation, considering the personal nature of these potential murders. Police are asking for any information that could lead them to whoever is committing these atrocious acts. Meanwhile, police are also tracking down and questioning all those who have had the ceramic fangs, 'Nightcaps', made recently in the greater New York area. Later on, we will be having an expert on young adult culture from the Univ
ersity of….-
I turned off the TV and wondered if this had affected Masteria; Alik almost admitted Masteria was responsible for this and he did allow it in his club. Although he wasn’t happy about it either so it wasn’t like he wanted these deaths to happen. I didn’t know why I instantly thought about him first, and then lept to his defense. Was it because he helped Sam out of a tight spot that night? He might have even saved her life. I was just remembering him because he was connected to Sam, I told myself. I had gotten to the point in an internal conversation where I was considering going to Masteria when the plane began to descend for the landing. My next memory was of Sam complaining about me not listening to her complain about letting her almost miss the landing. She really enjoyed takeoffs and landings.
