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[DRIFT:] So, wait, you mean to tell me this isn’t the first time you’ve dealt with nightmares like this?
[SHELBY:] Why are you…yeah. I mean—no, or, wait—[sigh] It’s not the first time. Not even the tenth, either. I…you don’t understand, Drift. He’s my—was my fledgling. I could feel when he died—could see it. I just don’t know why after twenty years, his face is coming back.
[DRIFT:] Well, we have to figure out what the heck is going on. Both with you and the city. Maybe if we record it, we’ll be able to look through for details. Something we might have missed.
[SHELBY:] Maybe. [Rustling] Hey, is there any extra blood or chicken laying around? I haven’t eaten yet.
[DRIFT:] God, two decades of being vampires and that sentence still somehow gets to me. [Chair scraping, shuffling] Here. There’s some extra in the fridge.
[SHELBY:] [Gulping, exhale] Thanks! Oh—nearly forgot about the whole recording thing.
[SHELBY:] Well…the nightmares started sometime around a month ago.
Shelby woke up with a cold sweat.
She scrambled out of bed, nearly tripping over the damp sheets to get to the bathroom. Dark spots danced around the edge of her vision as she leaned into the bathroom sink, splashing the icy water over her face.
She panted, breathing heavily over the sink as she stared down at her black undershirt.
soaked through with dripping red as a wooden stake reached out over his crimson cape—
Shelby shouted and stumbled back, gripping her shirt, which suddenly felt too tight, too claustrophobic on her pale chest. She breathed in and out, trying to calm her exploding nerves. One two, one two…
For a moment, the room was quiet again, save for her heavy breathing.
“Wait. Guys, you…you wouldn’t.”
Shelby leaned over and watched the tears fall into the sink.
“Please, wait, NO—”
She hadn’t been there.
“He was a liability, Shelby.”
And somehow, she could feel the stake go through his chest.
Yet with both of Avid’s murderers dead, Shelby still had an unresolved rage burning deep inside. As if no amount of justice could endure what they had put Avid through.
Is this how Owen felt, when he’d seen his lover die and became so corrupted he ravaged a town to rubble?
Now that she thought about it, is this why he hadn’t been the one to drive the stake in?
He had to see Avid die, because Avid got to have the happy ending that Owen never received. But some part of him still saw himself in Avid. He couldn’t be the one to take the life of someone so akin to his own past self.
Shelby shook her head. Twenty years ago, she told herself. It was twenty years ago.
But twenty seemed like such a small number now, knowing she could live forever.
As a vampire, Shelby couldn’t actually go to sleep for a long time. She just solved that problem by taking small naps on the rare occasion she actually did feel tired. And somehow, a twenty minute nap was enough to launch her into a panic-attack inducing nightmare.
Maybe that was the real reason creatures of the night were never supposed to sleep. Because being plunged into that sort of darkness resurfaced every regret they ever had.
Shelby flicked the light off in the bathroom. She didn’t even know why she had turned it on—she could see perfectly normal in the dark.
Old habit, she supposed.
A gentle knock came at her bedroom door.
“Shelby?” Drift’s muffled voice came out from behind the oak wood.
She nearly let out a sob, remembering the oak house she had built. She unclicked the lock and swung the door open.
Drift’s pale ash-white hair was tucked into a messy braid, over top of a maroon Harvard sweatshirt. Her red eyes glowed in crimson rings around her brown contacts.
Shelby stared into Drift’s eyes and was immediately thrown back into that moment on the bridge.
Drift let out a gentle laugh and put a hand on Shelby’s shoulder. “There’s a couple scars we haven’t been able to heal, right?” She joked.
Shelby’s silence said enough.
Drift sighed and brought her hand down, wrapping her arms around Shelby.
“Scott’s out grocery shopping. He should be back by dawn.” Drift said. “I can stay here for a while, if you want.”
Shelby finally opened her mouth to talk. She drew back at the way it clicked from dryness, aching for something to soothe her thirst. “It all feels so recent.”
“Twenty years-ish recent?”
“God, Drift, you know what I mean!”
Drift laughed. Shelby smiled a little.
She pulled back out of the hug and stepped over to the small window over her bed. Her face illuminated silver in the moonlight streaming in. Over the horizon, a faint golden glow began to seep ever so slightly into the night sky.
Drift pulled out the chair under Shelby’s desk and sat beside her. “Did you know that the detective agencies have all this crazy technology and screens and stuff to use to solve cases?” She mused. “And people here don’t even wear monocles anymore! Times change so crazily, am I right? This must’ve been how Scott felt when he saw a truck for the first time!”
Shelby didn’t turn from the window.
“Well, if it helps,” Drift frowned. “I still have the tape from your little interview. We can look over it for any little hints about your nightmares.”
“Scott said being a vampire is able to prevent hangovers, so why can’t it prevent nightmares?” Shelby responded.
Drift suddenly became very interested in her hair.
“I, uh…” Drift started. “Well, how about a change of topic? I saw Apo at the police station the other—”
Shelby whipped her head towards Drift, causing Drift to jump in her seat.
“You what!?” Shelby shouted.
Scott suddenly shifted out from the shadows, his white hair glistening in the fading moonlight.
“You WHAT!?” He yelled.
Drift nearly fell back in her chair, eyes darting between the two vampires now towering over her. It barely even registered that Scott had simply materialized back from his grocery store trip.
“He~ey, Scott…! Fun grocery run?” Drift drawled out sheepishly.
“There’s meat in the fridge that took a 30 minute line and one insane woman I debated killing right then and there to buy. If you two let it spoil, I swear to the heavens above I will throw you out this apartment.” Scott replied.
Drift blinked.
Scott rolled his eyes. “And don’t you ‘hey, Scott’ me! Apo just so happens to suddenly be in town after the anniversary of Avid’s death and you don’t tell anyone?” He scolded. He paced back and forth, his earrings clinging together like small bells.
“I’m sorry, the what!?” Drift shouted in response.
Shelby groaned. “For God’s sake, can we clear up one thing at a time!?” She let out a long, exasperated sigh. “First, Avid’s…anniversary. Secondly, the Apo thing. Then we can talk about Scott’s grocery drama afterwards.”
Scott pressed a finger to his head and cursed to himself. “November 9th. The day Avid…died. It was on Tuesday.”
Drift and Shelby looked at each other, then both turned back to Scott.
“I…completely forgot.” Drift muttered.
Shelby mumured an apology under her breath.
Scott sighed. “It’s not something I expected you to just have marked on your calendar. ‘Oh yeah, let’s just have an annual reminder that our friend just died on this day a couple years ago!’” He waved his hand around in a gesture.
Shelby pulled the shutters down and closed the window. “Alright, so what does this have to do with Apo again?”
Drift stood up and leaned against the maroon brick wall. “The other day—Thursday, I think it was?—I was at the police station dealing with some late work when Apo just…ran in. Like super frantically. Her hair was kind of darker, like she tried to dye it back or something, and all fluffy and frizzy, like a wet cat that just got blow dried—”
“Less filler, more detail.” Scott cut in.
Drift rubbed the back of her neck. “Yeah. Alright, so obviously I was immediately going kind of crazy. I mean, come on, “I never want to see you guys again” is the last thing she ever says to us, and now she’s in our city?” She waved a hand off to the side, gesturing to the flowing buildings of New York City outside. “She started talking all fast, like ‘I need the detective, I need the detective!’ So, being the y’know, detective, I came over to calm her down, and then she just said…”
She lowered her voice a bit, suddenly seeming even more nervous than before.
“...Holy hell, how did I not think of…” She murmured.
Shelby put a hand on Drift’s shoulder. “Take a second. It’s alright.” She said with a small smile.
Drift looked up at her. “No, it’s not.” She said quietly. “...Shelby, Apo said—”
Suddenly, the wall behind Drift exploded, sending bits of brick and white dust flying into the air. Scott raced forward, eyes closed and hands outstretched. The ringing in Drift’s ears was almost enough to block out the sound of Shelby’s scream.
She threw her hands forward, feeling around for any stable ground or land.
When she felt nothing but air, she opened her eyes to find herself falling.
“BAT!” Scott shouted from above.
Drift curled her arms and legs in, then felt herself shift forms midair. Just above where the ground was.
She hovered in her bat form above the ground.
A fall from that height certainly wouldn’t kill her as a vampire, but it would certainly hurt.
A crowd was already gathering around, taking pictures and videos of the obliteration. Rumors began to spread quickly, tying it to recent terrorism.
Drift hovered to the back of the apartment and flew up, surverying the damage.
The entire left side of Shelby’s entire room was gone. Charred bricks and floorboards crumbled around the edges, with pieces of foundation and wire curling out from the sides.
Scott called out somewhere from the living room, his voice muffled behind the remaining walls.
“Shelby!” He yelled. “Shelby!”
Drift shifted back into her vampiric form, pressing into the corner of Shelby’s room to avoid human attention. She opened the splintered door to see Scott shuffling around the living room, hands cupped around his mouth as he called their roomate’s name.
He looked up and met Drift’s eyes, his pupils dilated. “Did she fall? Did you see her bat away?” He asked quickly.
Drift threw herself onto the couch, her hand on her forehead as she ran through the events of what had just happened.
“No. No, I didn’t.” She responded. “Did—”
“Stay here.” Scott commanded.
Drift turned her head. “What?”
“Stay. Here.” Scott repeated. “I’m going to find her. She couldn’t have gone far, wherever the hell she went.”
“Scott, you can’t go out alone.” Drift stood and stepped forward, reaching out to grab his wrist. He quickly pulled away.
“Drift, I’m not telling you again.” He warned. “There’s food in the fridge, I have my flip phone on me, and—”
“I’m not letting you go alone—”
“STAY HERE.”
Scott’s voice richotched through Drift’s mind, sending her stumbling back onto the couch. She held her head and winced.
Sire. An instinctual voice behind her mind whispered. Stay. Your sire commands it.
Scott had a pale hand clamped over his mouth, the sudden crimson glow in his iris dimming down again. “Drift, I’m so sorry—”
Drift rolled her finger around her forehead, soothing the aching that had erupted when Scott’s voice had rung out. “S—si—” She hissed.
“Don’t—don’t say it.” He quickly interjected. “I don’t…I’ve never used that tone before. I don’t know if it’s a power or some sort of link since I turned you—”
“Go—go find Shelby.” Drift muttered.
Scott sucked in a breath and turned to the door. He paused as he put a hand on the handle.
“Drift,” He said slowly. “What did Apo say to you?”
Drift looked up, the red shining through her coffee-colored contacts.
“‘It’s Avid.’” Drift quoted. “‘Avid is alive.’”
Shelby blinked slowly, her ears aching and ringing.
Her head was pounding, and her vision refused to switch to her night-piercing eyesight.
She reached a hand forward, then found she was on the ground. On musty stone.
Blood smeared stone.
She recoiled her hand and quickly shot up, her knees shaky and unstable. Her vision finally clicked.
Stones were placed just barely above her head, and on the ground lay a smudged pool of red next to a used stake.
“Please, wait, NO—”
Shelby suddenly found herself clawing at the stones above her, the stone room feeling too tight, too claustrophobic, too small to handle the rushing visions and memories and trauma invading her mind. She finally pulled enough stones away to reveal the high walls of a stone-mined hole. She gulped, the thought already coming to her before she needed to see for herself.
She jumped, her power rushing through her and throwing her all the way up the thirteen-feet walls. She caught herself on the ledge and pulled herself up.
The crypt.
She had been inside their trap at the crypt.
Where they had staked Avid.
She turned towards the stairs to exit, then found an invisible wall keeping her back.
The crypt enterance had been completely caved in, a block of silver in the center of the rubble.
And as she turned around, she noticed a block of silver had been in every wall.
Someone had trapped her in here. In the room where her fledgling, her friend, had been murdered for being a “liability.”
Suddenly, a footstep echoed through the room.
Shadows drifted in from the edges of the room, creating a darkness Shelby’s eyes couldn’t adjust to. She watched in horror as a shape began to materalize out of the inky black.
She saw that red cape. The pale hair. The outfit tailored so similar to what her own sire had once donned. But different—a large horn stood up like an antler from the top-right side of his head.
His eyes glowed through the darkness, the left red like normal, the right a sharp gold color that seemed to lock her vision into it, keeping her from moving, from thinking…
She shook the trance off and stared.
“You…you’re…” She stuttered.
His laugh echoed out, his own voice and another overlapping into one. Like a rope made out of two threads that weren’t supposed to ever meet.
“Hey, Shelby!” Avid smiled. “Did you miss me?”