Post by demona on Apr 19, 2009 17:46:07 GMT
Hi All,
So this is my first ever fanfic I've written, let alone been brave enough to post somewhere. Please be gentle!
Disclaimer: I know nothing about copyright laws, but I do know that I don't own any of the characters, or the original genius idea of vampire high, so please don't sue me!
Warning: There are a few swear words in this, so I'm sorry If I offend anyone, its just that oh bother, blimey or crikey just didn't cut it at that particular moment in the story.
Right here we go...
When the great eclipse plunged the world into darkness; the vampire race erupted into a civil war. The blood-thirsty Fury battled with the enlightened Elders for domination of the un-dead. In desperation the Elders gathered up those young vampires that could be saved and entrusted them to me, to humanise them, to tame their instincts and teach them how to live amongst mortals.
Dr R Murdoch
The vampiress sat alone in her hotel room cross-legged on the bed, patiently waiting for sunset, shortly after which, she would meet the others in the lobby and go out for dinner. Tomorrow was the last day of the writing workshop, and then Merrill could go back to the Mansbridge Academy and the experiment, her home. She thought back to the boarding school, where she and four other vampires were being taught to live as human and to curb their killing instinct. Dr Murdoch, head of the school had been so impressed with her progress in learning about human society, that he had suggested that she take this course. A task which her mentor thought would help her get in touch with human emotion, allowing her to blend in to human society easier and Merrill was happy to have been given this chance to develop her writing skills. Never-the-less after a week of pretending to be human she was tired; living on a day schedule was not easy. There was the constant worry of standing too close to the windows, or making excuses for not going outside during the day, the everlasting temptation of fresh blood all around her. Unable to sleep at night and not allowed to sleep during the day, Merrill had not slept in a week and was feeling low on energy. Merrill looked down at the short piece of poetry in her lap and read over it again hoping it would be good enough for the presentation tomorrow. The task was to write a short poem about unrequited love, it seemed easy enough when she sat down to write about her fellow vampire Drew, his angular face, that dark hair, deep sensuous eyes, how she had thought he was the one, but he was not interest in her. Drew only seemed to like mortals, first Sherry, and now he seemed to have taken to the red-headed girl, Dillan. She looked in the mirror at her reflection, glad it was only a myth that vampires didn’t have reflections. She looked at herself, her thin body, her long brown hair framing her usually pale face now covered in make-up, giving the illusion she was human and actually alive, would Drew fall for her now?
She read through the poem and knew that it wasn’t about her unrequited love for Drew; it was about Marty’s love for her. It was no use denying that she and Marty had grown closer since that weekend they were alone, and the sacrifice he had made for her. Left without access to their blood packets, both she and Marty had faced withdrawal and hunger like they had never known before. He had helped her fight the temptation to feed off a human student, and risked his own life, allowing her to drink from him, so that she could live, trusted her not to take too much allowing him to live. There seemed to be hidden depths to Marty, a secret he seemed only willing to share with her, and that made her feel special. Could unrequited love ever be resolved? She looked at the end of her poem and knew the answer. The knock on the door made her jump; she had been lost in her thoughts. Gingerly she got up off the bed, and peaked through the curtains, it was dark, it was safe. The door was knocked again.
“I’m coming.” She said as she picked up her purse, and headed for the door. She opened it to find a man in his mid-thirties, Michael, standing there. He smiled at her with his big brown eyes, light brown hair flopping across his left eye. Merrill suppressed a shudder, and stopped herself from picking up any stray thoughts that might escape his mind, for once she didn’t want to be able to read minds, this man gave her the creeps.
“Ready to go?” He asked her, Merrill merely nodded her head.
The Mansbridge Academy loomed quiet and picturesque in the dim light of the early evening, home to boarding students during the school year; its dorms lay empty during the summer months. The secret dorms in the cellar though were a different matter, they were still inhabited.
Marty Strickland lay in his coffin, excitement growing in the pit of his stomach, Merrill would be home tomorrow night and he had his plan to figure out. He would get her a gift and tell her how much he missed her being around and...and...and he was hungry. He paused his thoughts, focusing on his need for blood. Quickly he moved out of his coffin and into the general living area where the others were also waiting for their blood allotments.
“So Merrill’s back tomorrow night?” Karl asked, tossing his football from hand-to-hand. “Maybe we could get a game going, girls against boys? We should make the most of the day schoolers not being here.”
“ I’ll have to share my dorm again.” Groaned Essie. The blonde vampire had been enjoying using the extra space to hang up her new clothes and shoes she had been buying over the internet. She wondered whether she could persuade Merrill to go live in one of the empty day schoolers rooms for the summer, after all she would be used to living like a human by now.
“Be honest Essie, you’ve missed having her around.” Drew reflected, looking up from his poetry book.
“Haven’t we all.” Essie said with a knowing glance at Marty as he collected his blood pack.
“What?” He asked.
“Nothing.” Essie replied. Marty looked at Essie, it must be female intuition he thought, unless she and Merrill were closer than he thought. But then again hadn’t they all got closer to each other, even he and Drew could now stand to be in the same room. He drank his blood thoughtfully, and the idea came to him.
“Is Murdoch still up?” He asked the others as he moved towards the steps that lead up out of the cellar and into the foresaid office, not waiting for a reply.
The secret entrance was open, and Marty stood hesitantly in the door, watching the dark haired middle-aged man, dressed in his normal tweed suit, write in his journal, behind his big antique desk.
Reginald Murdoch felt a presence in the room, but did not look up; he knew it was one of his night students. Instead he finished the sentence he was writing. Shutting the book, and replacing the fountain pen in its stand he looked up at the vampire, standing so unusually quiet and shy in the doorway. Blood pack in hand, only half drunk; Marty looked at Dr Murdoch with thoughtful blue eyes.
“What can I do for you Marty?” Dr Murdoch asked.
“Can I ask a favour?” Marty said without moving. Dr Murdoch lifted a hand gesturing Marty to take a seat at his desk.
“You can ask.” Marty moved from the doorway and took the seat. He shifted his weight in the chair, obviously uncomfortable with the situation, nervously sipping at his blood pack until it was gone. Marty sat staring at the empty packet in his hands, carefully choosing his words; he didn’t want to mess this up and he didn’t want to appear like a big sap either. “What is it Marty?” Dr Murdoch asked in a sympathetic voice. Marty looked up and took a deep breath.
“Are you sure you won’t take me up on my offer?” Michael asked as the final seminar of the conference broke up. “It seems silly for you to hang around here for the next few hours waiting for the night bus, when I have to drive right by Mansbridge.” Merrill was running out of excuses to refuse the lift home that he was offering her. In truth she hadn’t even thought about the fact that it was still daytime, and that she would burst into flames if she went out now, the only reason that she did not want to take Michael up on his offer was because she didn’t feel safe with him.
Michael, a husband and a father, cheerful, kind and always considerate, seemed to be liked by everyone at the writer’s workshop. Everyone except Merrill. Her mind reading abilities had shown her what truly lay beneath the surface of that angelic face, and it scared her. She almost laughed at the fact that a vampire who was strong enough to kill this man in mere seconds was afraid of him. Merrill had always thought that vampires were inherently evil, but Michael had proved to her that humans could be just as evil. Merrill had at first, refused to use her powers to read the minds of her fellow human class mates, but after days of catching Michael looking at her out of the corner of his eye, and the effort he made to be closer to her and physically touch her, she couldn’t resist a peak. His thoughts were lustful and disgusting, almost predatory in nature, the beginnings of an obsession. From then on Merrill had tried to limit her contact with him, but to no avail, and now she stood before him, petrified that he might be able to talk her into taking the three hour car journey with him back home.
“I’ll wait until after dark, if you want, I know you have a condition that means you are sensitive to the sunlight.” His voice was gently full of care and concern.
“No really, you should be getting home to your wife and daughter, I bet you miss them.” The mere mention of his family brought a darkness across his eyes for just a moment, a mumbled ‘yeah’ in response. Then suddenly his smile was back.
“Well it was really nice to meet you Merrill.” Michael kissed her on the cheek and hugged her. He was stronger than he looked, and the hug was uncomfortably tight. “I hope we meet again my dear Merrill.” He whispered into her ear. The hug was ended and he picked up his bag, “Maybe I’ll stop by Mansbridge one day and say hi.” His normal smile plastered on his face as he moved to say good bye to the remaining delegates leaving Merrill to shrink into the shadows and wait until dark.
Merrill sat with her head against the window pane, the rhythmic humming of the buses engine sending her into a half sleep. Her thoughts drifted into fantasy. She was sitting at a table set up for a meal for two, out on the patio in the moonlight. Merrill sat waiting for him, her long white dress glowing in the darkness, long brown hair hanging in a plait down her back, the blood red lipstick accenting the paleness of her face. Music drifted softly on the night breeze, setting a romantic air to the setting. Suddenly his silhouette was in the doorway, tall and manly against the harshness of the light from inside. He moved forward out onto the patio; she could see the black tie outfit he was wearing causing a stirring of excitement in her. He moved out around the edge of the patio, his face hidden by the darkness, as he moved round behind her. She felt his gentle hands on her shoulders softly massaging her neck. Merrill felt his breath as he leant in close; she waited to hear Drew’s voice.
“Merrill, you are my One”. The voice said but it wasn’t Drew’s, it was Marty’s.
Merrill sat bolt upright in her seat, her eyes awake and open. She consciously looked around her, thankful that the few other people on the bus all seemed to be asleep. Was she really just dreaming about Marty in that way? But deep down she knew that wasn’t the first time her dreams of Drew had morphed into dreams of Marty. Could she really be starting to get over Drew? She had been trying for months, and finally it seemed to be happening. But to fall for Marty instead? As Essie had so eloquently put it he was a manipulator, a liar, a short attention grabbing clown, someone whose only way of connecting with others was to hurt them. But was that really the true Marty? Merrill knew that if there was a joke to be made at the expense of another, he was the one who made it. Marty was the one with all the snide remarks and always trying to pick a fight but in the end she had thought that he was all noise and no action. However, there were those times when he had surprised her. That time he had helped her when Dr Murdoch was ill, there was nothing in it for him, and of course that weekend when he had allowed her to feed on him, risking his own life. She pictured him in her mind, his jet black hair sticking up all over the place, his lean body and chiselled cheek bones, his cheeky smile. The way he could make her smile, like when they had danced, and when she had played the piano and he had sung. Merrill couldn’t suppress the smile that had begun to spread across her face, she bit her nail nervously. Marty had been so sweet to her, understanding that she was hurting over Drew, and saying that it was ok. That wasn’t the Marty he displayed to the others, only to her, was he genuine? She knew that he was, her mind –reading abilities had proven that. But they were total opposites, how could it work? It was ridiculous. She straighten the smile from her face, and was resolute that she had no feelings for him, but even as she did she couldn’t help but remember how nice it had felt when he had massaged her back, and the smile returned. What was it had said to her, if you can’t be with the one you love, love the one you’re with; Merrill leant her head back onto the window pane and thought about her poem, was a vampire truly capable of loving another?
The bus pulled into the station only a few miles away from Mansbridge. Merrill hoped that Dr Murdoch was already there, she desperately wanted to be back at the school, a place she know felt was her home, with her vampiric family. She waited impatiently for the bus driver to open the baggage hold, and hand her, her suitcase. He shut the hold, and climbed back into the bus, to continue on with his journey. Merrill moved through the car park, her coat wrapped around her slender body, suitcase in hand, looking for life in the darkness of the very early hours of the morning. She saw the car she knew belonged to Dr Murdoch, and although she couldn’t believe what she saw, she couldn’t stop herself from smiling.
He was just sitting there, on the bonnet of the car, his dark hair sticking up all over the place, like he had been given an electric shock, the sunglasses he worn accentuated the paleness of his face, which seemed to glow in the dim light of the car park lighting. He wore all black, painting the typical image of a vampire, leather trousers and a black jumper beneath his long leather jacket. He was just sitting there a huge smile on his face and a blood red rose between his teeth. He was hitting on her again, and for once Merrill didn’t mind.
He sat in his car, not far from the scene. He watched the guy jump off the bonnet of the car and walk up to her. He had handed her a flower of some kind, probably a rose, and she had actually allowed him to hug her! But he knew Merrill was just being kind, she would never betray him, but if she wouldn’t tell this stranger to back off he would, she was too nice, too fragile, she needed him to protect her. He saw the way the young man with the long flowing coat and stupid hair fail to move away from Merrill, staying in close proximity, how he frequently stroked her arm as they chatted. He would kill that man; nothing would keep him away from his Merrill. He stayed still as he watched the stupid young man with sunglasses on at night take her suitcase, and lead her to the car, opening the door of the car to allow her to get in, then shutting the door, he moved round the back of the car, tossing her suitcase carelessly into the boot of the car, and finally himself getting in the driver’s side. The car sprung into life, and it moved out the car park. Michael didn’t like this guy, he was endangering his Merrill, not only was he wearing sunglasses at night, he had failed to turn on his car head lights! Michael started his car engine and followed them out of the car park.
“Why did that driver flash his head lights at me?” Marty whined from behind the wheel, as he took another country road corner a little faster than Merrill would have liked.
“Perhaps because you haven’t put the cars headlights on.” Merrill said as nicely as she could, whilst holding onto her seat edges.
“Oh.” Marty said and immediately turned the lights on. “Well it’s not like a need them to see in the dark.”
“No, but it does help the other human drivers to see you.” Merrill accented the human to make her point. Marty looked at her and smiled that smile of his, showing his pearly white teeth, without fangs. She shook her head. “Marty, slow down you’re going to miss the...” She stopped her pointless sentence as the car drove past the turn off for the school. “We were suppose to take that left turn to get to the school.”
“Yeah, but we’re not going to school.” Marty stated matter-of-factly, he glanced quickly at Merrill and saw the nervous, worried and slightly frightened face he was expecting. “Don’t worry; I’ve cleared it with Murdoch.”
“Where are we going?” Merrill asked anxiously, she was tired and wasn’t up to one of Marty’s practical jokes.
“Check out the back seat.” Marty nodded his head backwards and he kept his focus on the road. She looked over her shoulder and saw a picnic basket and blanket. That smile grew on her face again.
“Shouldn’t they be back by now?” Drew said as he looked at the clock in Murdoch’s office. It was almost 5 o’clock. Essie went to answer, but was interrupted by Karl running into the office.
“I can’t find Marty anywhere, so I guess it’s just the three of us for cards then.” He shrugged as he pulled up a chair next to Essie.
“Oh I wouldn’t worry about them. Marty will be around somewhere, and Merrill will be back shortly,” She said as she shuffled the cards.
“I reckon Merrill’s loved acting all human this week. I bet she could even make a living from writing and live in the human world easily. Do you think she’ll be the first to leave here?” Karl asked as he looked at the cards Essie had dealt him. Essie sat thoughtfully.
“Well, at least as a writer, she wouldn’t have to go out during the day; she could be one of those weird recluse writers.” She replied.
“What job would you do out in the human world Essie?” Karl asked
“Oh Karl, that’s easy, I’d be a fashion designer. Sleep all day, party all night, all those fabulous clothes and shoes!”
“What about you Drew?” Karl turned to Drew as he sat at the table and picked up his cards.
“Vampires don’t need jobs.” He said sulkily, looking at his hand.
“Yeah, but if we are successful in this project and we go out and live in human society, it would seem slightly odd if we didn’t have a job.” Stated Essie.
“Do you reckon I could do something in sports?” Karl asked.
Drew looked at the clock as it chimed,
“She should be back by now; dawn will be here soon. Murdoch did go pick her up right?” He asked anxious.
“Really Drew, I shouldn’t worry.” Essie said with a knowing smile, sorting out her hand of cards in her perfected manicured hands.
“What’s that suppose to mean?” Drew pointedly asked her.
“Well let’s just say I don’t think we should bother waiting up for them.” Essie smiled as she sat poised to raise her stakes in the game ahead.
Merrill stared up at the night sky, stretched out on the blanket, she felt totally relaxed, she closed her eyes drifting into a half sleep. Marty noisily slurping at his blood pack brought her back to the here and now. She opened one eye sleepily at looked at him, lying next to her, staring at her.
“So tell me more.” He begged. Merrill fully opened both eyes and sat up, Marty copying her movements.
“What do you want to know?”
“Did you eat actual food? Or alcohol?” Merrill grimaced as she remembered that first evening she had gone out to dinner. She had eaten too much food for someone who hadn’t eaten food in years, probably decades. That night, she had had terrible stomach cramps.
“My stomach didn’t like too much food, so I only ate little amounts of light foods, like salads, or raw meats, or as raw as I could get.” She laughed as she remembered the thoughts of her fellow classmates at the workshop. “They all thought I was on some weird diet or anorexic or something. Actually most of them thought I was a hypochondriac, with the whole not going out in sunlight thing. They all thought I was scared of getting skin cancer.” Marty sblack personed at her story.
“So Merrill, you cheated and read the minds of the other students. No wonder you did so well on the course.” Merrill gave him a playful tap of the arm.
“No, I would never read their minds for that purpose.”
“But for entertainment? So go on, tell me more, what other strange human thoughts did you pick up on?” Merrill thought back to the third night out, she had attempted to drink some wine, but it had gone straight to her head. That was when she had started to read all her fellow human classmates minds. It was that night, she had read Michael’s mind. Marty saw the smile disappear from her face, and a slight look of fear appear in her eye, her face dropped to look at her lap. “What?” He asked her, moving his hand slowly up and placing it on her shoulder, he moved his head down and tilted it up so he could look into her eyes in her downward gaze.
“There was this guy; Michael.” She spoke softly. “He...” she paused looking for the right words. “I had forgotten that humans could be monsters too.” Marty moved his hand to gently lift up her face level to his own. He had expected to see disappointment in her eyes, and perhaps a little sadness, but all he saw was horror and fear.
“What did he do?” Marty paused “Did he do anything to you?” Marty rephrased the question. Merrill shook her head.
“I’m having a lovely time Marty; I don’t want to spoil it by talking about it.” Marty nodded and moved his hand from her chin, softly stroking her cheek, before moving his hand away. He looked in to Merrills’ familiar blue eyes, he could tell he was moving closer to her, and she wasn’t moving away, the urge to kiss her was so strong. Marty hesitated, he wasn’t sure he could take her pushing him away again, he’d lost count how many times he had been close to kissing her when she had cruelly shoved him away, or even smashed a vase on his head. Merrill felt a sense of déjà vu; like she had been this close to kissing Marty before, like she had kissed Marty before and wanted to do so, but couldn’t place the event. Was he going to kiss her now? After what seemed like an eternity, Marty slowly edged forward, placing a hand on Merrills’ thigh. Merrill closed her eyes, an excitement stirring in her that she had not felt since Drew had broken her heart.
Merrills’ eye flew open at the sound. Marty pulled away and began fumbling in his jacket pocket.
“What’s that beeping?” She asked, as Marty pulled a mobile phone out of his pocket and began to angrily punch the keypad. The phone went silent. Marty half laughed, half snorted as he sat staring at the phone in his hands, he had to laugh or else he’d cry. How cliché he thought. He held the phone up in the air so that Merrill could see it.
“Alarm, to tell us dawn’s on its way. We have just enough time to pack up and get back to school before we fry.” Merrill had picked up on his thoughts, and had to agree it was a total cliché, and smiled at him.
“I suppose we had better go then.” She said. They stood up, Merrill picked up the empty blood packs that lay scattered around them. Marty picked up the blanket, screwing it up into a ball and stuffing it as best he could into the basket. Simultaneously they went to pick up the basket their heads almost knocking into each other, their hands touched, electricity sparked the air again as they looked at each other, their lips only inches apart.
Michael sat behind the wheel of his car, its engine off; its lights dark. An anger, a hatred building inside of him, and yet he could still not believe Merrill was betraying him like this, after all they had shared, all their moments, all those dinners. No it was this stranger, this silly boy. He watched the scene in front of him until he couldn’t take it anymore.
Marty couldn’t believe he was actually kissing Merrill, and there was no sensation of him flying backward as she fended him off. Could she be teasing him again? No that was a one-off, that wasn’t her, the real her anyway. This was real, this was actually happening. The basket dropped to the floor as his arms moved to embrace her. Her hands were in his hair and it felt so good, he was so lost in the moment that he first he put the faint growling sound down to nothingness, but the sound got louder and closer. He tried hard to gather his thoughts and place the sound that was coming towards him; this couldn’t be a dream, could it? Sense overcame his desire and he opened one eye to check his surroundings. It was only then when he saw it coming at them at speed that his could place the sound of the noise to a car engine heading straight for them. His instinct kicked in and for the only time ever, he promised himself, he pushed Merrill as far anyway from him as he could. Although it all must have happened in a few seconds, everything was in slow motion. He saw Merrill fly through the air and land on her back at least 100 yards away, then he turned and saw the bright headlights of the car, only yards away from him, and then he too felt the sensation of flying through the air.
The coldness of the water brought Marty out of his stupor. What the hell was going on?
Michael slammed on his brakes hard and got out of the car. He must have killed that guy; he was nearly going 60 miles an hour. He heard Merrills’ voice screaming Mikey, his name. Michael felt the warm glow of love in his stomach; she had a pet name for him. She needed him; she needed him to help her, save her from her attacker. He turned and saw her lying on the floor trying to get up, he ran over to help his damsel.
“Marty!” Merrill screamed his name over and over. “Marty!” She tried to get up, but she couldn’t will her body to move, what was happening? She was so overwhelmed at kissing Marty she didn’t realise he had pushed her away until she saw him get hit by the light. The light, what was that? She felt herself being pulled up roughly and hugged tightly. Where was Marty? This couldn’t be him; the light had pushed him away. Merrill pulled herself away from the person hugging her and looked into their eyes and everything became clear. There was no mistaking those eyes, those cold, hard, dead, insane eyes. Michael.
Marty staggered out of the water, thrashing with the reeds. He was drenched, cold, and disorientated. Why was he outside, why was he in a lake, why wasn’t he at Mansbridge? The scream ringing through the early dawn brought him back to his senses. Merrill. Marty looked up and saw her being dragged to a car, by, by a human? That couldn’t be right. Marty mused at the situation in front of him. Why wasn’t Merrill attacking him, feeding on him, killing him?
Fear overwhelmed Merrill; it was like she was having a quivering all over again, another premonition of her own death. Why was she so afraid of this human, she should be fighting him, killing him, but that was wrong, she couldn’t do that anymore. The human was speaking to her, telling her to get in the car, but she didn’t want to. Her body was heavy, she couldn’t move from her kneeling position. Why was he doing this, he was human, and he should be afraid of her, a vampire. Very afraid. Merrills’ demon instinct started to kick in.
Michael couldn’t make sense of the situation, what was wrong with Merrill, why didn’t she want to come with him? He had just saved her from an attacker, surely she should be grateful, and would want to be his forever now; perhaps she was in shock. He took hold of her roughly by her shoulders and looked into her face, but her eyes weren’t the same cool beautiful blue sapphires they should be, they were red rubies, angry looking. And there was something wrong with her mouth. What was happening to her? His preoccupation with Merrills’ new look prevented him of seeing or even sensing the shadow that was moving towards him with speed and force. The pain as his back hit the side of his car was only secondary to the pain of his throat as he struggled to breath.
Marty held the pathetic human by the throat with one hand, his feet dangling a few inches from the floor. He would crush the life out of this lesser being. Anger held Marty in its grasp, and he was enjoying feeling like a god again, what was one more human life, he had taken plenty over the centuries. This one deserved it.
Merrill looked at Marty, water dripping from his body, his eyes red, his fangs out. Slowly strangling Michael, part of Merrill wanted to Marty to continue, to protect her, but she repressed it down to where her deepest darkest thoughts were banished, this was not the human way, this was not what the experiment had taught them to do.
“Marty, stop. You’re killing him.” She pleaded her eyes blue, her fang withdrawn.
“Why should I? Is this him? Is this Michael?” There was no reply, “Merrill answer me.” Marty roared at her, turning his blood red gaze upon her form kneeing meekly on the ground.
“Yes, but think of the experiment, think of everything we have learnt; of what we are trying to become, you do this and you’re back to square one.”
“Maybe I don’t care, doesn’t he deserve it?”
“We don’t have the right to play judge and executioner. He has a family, a little girl. ”
“Which he obviously cares nothing about or else he’d be with them.”
The night sky had become noticeable lighter, dawn was coming, and another panic and fear overcame Merrill.
“Marty, the sun, we must get back.” She stood up pulling at the arm that was holding Michael in the air. Marty peered over his shoulder to the east and saw the dawn coming, and realised he was out of time, if he was to live another night. He roughly dropped Michael to the floor and grabbed Merrill by the hand and together they moved at speed to their own car parked a little way ahead of them.
Michael sat on the grass dazed and confused, rubbing his throat, rasping in all the air his lungs could hold. Why had they just left like that? How had they moved so quickly, what was wrong with their eyes, and their mouths? Michael tried to focus his thoughts, they had run away from the dawn, and Merrill had refused to go out in the daylight. For some unknown reason he thought back to the dinners at the conference, the way Merrill had only eaten meat, and very raw meat, how he had once seen her, when she didn’t know he was watching, drink some red liquid from a packet. And that guy had been so very strong. Then finally, he realised what was wrong with their mouths, what his mind had refused to acknowledge before. They had fangs.
Marty raced through the deserted streets of the early morning. He could already feel the early morning rays prickle his skin. He slapped the steering wheel angrily.
“I should have just snapped his neck.” Marty slapped the steering wheel hard again. Merrill stayed quiet processing what had happened. “We are vampires Merrill, we should have just killed him, we are gods.”
“You sound like your part of the Fury.” Merrill whispered quietly. Marty slapped the steering hard one last time, and then sighed. He turned to look at Merrill, meek little Merrill trying so hard to be human. Merrill looked at Marty; she noticed his eyes had turned back to normal. Marty caught her gaze, and looked back at the road.
“I just wanted to protect you.” He whispered.
“I know.” Merrill moved her hand and placed it on the steering wheel on top of Marty’s and gave it a squeeze. The moment was there again, just like it had been before the alarm had gone off, and Michael had driven into them. Suddenly there was no fear, no panic, just calm.
A flash of light from the first rays of the sun peaking over the horizon bounced off the window.
“nuts, hold on.” Marty slammed his foot down hard on the accelerator, and turned hard on to the private road, towards the Mansbridge academy. They only had moments left; both of them could feel their skin start to itch; then came the first prickles of a burning sensation. Marty screeched to halt outside the main door, and the pair got out of the car as fast as they could. Marty opened the door, just as the sun came at full force over the horizon. The two vampires dived inside, and shut the door, shutting out the light with the thick cool wood. They leant panting for breath, the coldness of the door soothing their skin.
“Ever feel like your life is one long sitcom?” Marty asked with a weak smile.
Marty pushed his hair back, letting the water flatten it to his head. The shower was cold, perfect for soothing his skin. He washed off the grimy pond water and felt better. What a night. He let his mind wander back through the centuries, nope, he really couldn’t think of a time when he had a night like this. But he had kissed Merrill, properly, well at least for a second or two before anything else had gone wrong. His perfect plan was in ruins, so where did that leave him now? And what should he do about this Michael? He groaned as no answers would come to him, now was not the time for questions, they could be asked later, now was time for sleep. Marty turned off the shower, and listened. There was no sound, they had not woken anyone up with their urgent dash into the school, he was grateful; he didn’t feel like answering any of their questions right now either. He roughly dried his hair, and then tied the towel loosely around his waist and walked back to his dorm, and his coffin.
Merrill sat and listened patiently to hear his footsteps coming back from the bathroom. The soft patter of bare feet passed by her dorm, just outside the curtain she had drawn. She slid silently from her coffin, and hesitated, unsure as to whether to go see Marty. Merrill sighed and pushed her way through the curtain, and crossed the room to the boys’ dorm.
“Marty,” Merrill whispered as she pushed the curtain aside. Marty turned round to face his visitor, completely naked, his towel round his neck, as he used the ends of it to dry his ears. Merrills’ jaw hung loosely as she tried to utter some sensible words. Even in the dimness of the dorm, lit only by a candle, Marty’s smirk was un-mistakable.
“Would you mind turning around, so I could put some clothes on.” Marty whispered; there was not a chance in hell he was going to risk waking the others, and was grateful that Merrill hadn’t screamed. But she did look adorable, her mouth hanging wide open, her cheeks as pink as if she was living, Marty didn’t even realise vampires could blush.
“Of course.” Merrill stuttered as she shielded her eyes from the sight of a full frontal naked Marty, and turned her back on her fellow vampire. She cursed herself, completely embarrassed, why had seen been so eager to go see him? Marty grabbed the first pair of clean trousers he could find, and put them on, but nothing else.
“So, what can I do for you?” Even whispering the thingyiness of his voice rang loud and true. Merrill gingerly looked over her shoulder to see if Marty had put any clothes on yet, she could see that he had yet to put a shirt on but was relieved when she let her eyes wandered downwards that he had at least got trousers on and so turned round fully. Marty was standing there, arms crossed against his bare chest. His muscles weren’t as big as Karl’s, but as lean as Marty was, he was toned. Very toned.
“Merrill?” Marty’s voice brought Merrill out of her daydream. Marty looked at Merrill still stuttering for words. She had changed her clothes too; a simple black dress hung on her thin frame, her feet were bare, and she looked good without any of the make-up she was wearing to look human.
“I, erm, I,” Marty looked at her, impatience growing on his face. “Nevermind.” Merrill turned to leave, but Marty moved quickly, gently catching her arm before she left.
“Are you ok?” Marty asked now with concern evident in his voice, the irrepressible Marty had disappeared. Merrill shook her head. “I,” she exhaled, “I don’t want to be alone right now. I was wondering whether you would stay up and talk for a while.”
“Merrill you look knackered, you haven’t slept, in what, a week?” Merrill bit her nail nervously, and nodded, “it’s just...” Merrill couldn’t finish her sentence, she couldn’t explain the anxiety she was feeling, how she was scared to be alone, the stupid fear she had of this mortal coming back. Marty looked at his coffin, then back at Merrill.
“If Essie and Karl can fit into one of these coffins, then you and I will definitely be able to.” Merrill pulled her arm out of Marty’s grasp, a slight horrified look on her face.
“Whoa, don’t get me wrong, but after the night I’ve had, and the week you’ve had, we could both do with some sleep, and if you don’t want to be on your own...” Marty shrugged, and walked casually to his coffin, “I promise I won’t cop a feel.” He said holding his hands up in the air.
Merrill considered her options. She really didn’t want to be alone, and yes she was tired. Michael had un-nerved her like no one had ever done before; at least not since she was made a vampire. She thought of Marty, and how he would typically suggest that she could spend the day in his coffin with him, but she also knew that although only a few months ago the thought of doing such a thing would have repulsed her, she didn’t feel that way anymore. She watched as Marty slid into his coffin, still half naked, she knew they would be up close and personal; coffins weren’t built for two. What would the others think if they found out? What would Drew think? Merrill glanced back at the way she had come, through the curtain and into her own dorm, to where her coffin lay. She knew if she was in there alone her mind would not stop thinking and she would go another day without sleep. She turned back to Marty; lying in his coffin, propped up on one elbow; still looking at her.
Marty lay there in the darkness of his coffin, despite his tiredness he couldn’t sleep; the huge grin on his face and the body in his arms prevented him from doing so. He listened quietly to the rhythmic breathing of Merrill finally asleep on his chest. They must have whispered to each other for about an hour before conversation slowly dropped off, and shortly after so did Merrill, her exhaustion finally taking over her anxiety. They had talked about nothing important; mostly Marty had filled her in on the escapades of the group whilst she was at the conference. Speaking of normality seemed to calm her nerves allowing her to relax; Marty could physically feel her tension dissolve, as she lay off to one side of his body, her head resting on his chest. Now he was here awake alone, an excitement growing at having the prospect of Merrill trust him like she had and that this may just lead to something more than a friendship, but desperately trying not to get too excited. Despite his cold shower, he felt like he could do with another one, but there was no way he could move without disturbing Merrill. So he lay there, thinking of everything possible to cool his urges; the disturbing image of Murdoch in a pair of tight speedo’s finally dampened his desire to an ember, allowing him to enjoy the sensation of Merrill merely sleeping next to him, sending him to a peaceful dream.
Michael opened the door to his home in a daze, but it had not been the night without sleep that was his distraction. He made his way to the kitchen and sat down at his place at the breakfast bar. He looked around him. Crayon drawings were pinned to the fridge, alongside photos of him and his ‘two girls’, his wife Susan, and daughter, Chloe. The draining board was filled with washed dishes waiting to be put away, papers for recycling in a neat little stack in the corner, a calendar with numerous appointments scribbled alongside dates. He put his head in his hands, how he longed to share his life with Merrill, instead of having this one.
“Oh my god!” Michael was removed forcibly from his daydream by the shrill voice of his wife. “I didn’t think you’d be back until this afternoon, did you get up early so you could get back here to see Chloe before she went to riding? She’ll be so happy to see her daddy!” Michael was always surprised how his wife managed to be able to say so much without seeming to breathe. It irritated him. “I’ll put on some coffee for you; it looks like you need some. I’ll make some pancakes too shall I?”
Michael didn’t answer; he knew his wife would make pancakes even if he said no. He tried to block her out as she rattled around the kitchen getting the morning breakfast ready, her endless chatter about everything she and their child had done this week, during his absence. He focused on Merrill, his love. He missed her already, had it only been last night that they had hugged and sworn everlasting love to each other? No something was wrong with that picture, something his brain didn’t want to admit. That’s right, Merrill had been attacked by a stalker, and he had saved her. But if he had saved her, what was he doing back in his kitchen with his wife? That’s right, the stalker had taken Merrill from him, or had she gone with him willing? But of course she had, that was Merrill, she had gone with him to save Michaels life, that boy had been strangling him. Michael touched his throat gingerly, and felt the bruising. That was right; the damsel always makes a sacrifice for her true love; just like in fiction.
“Here you are hon.” Michael looked at the mug of coffee his wife had placed in front of him, its steam rising before his eyes. She had kissed him on the head and then had gone back to making the pancakes. Michael turned his thoughts back to Merrill; there was something different about her, and the man that had taken her away. The man had seemed eerily pale, as had Merrill that one morning, he saw her coming back to the hotel just before dawn. Dawn, why was dawn so important? Merrill was ill, she couldn’t go out in sunlight, but the man had also shown fear of the dawn. Could he too have the same illness as Merrill? There was another detail, something important; the annoying background chatter coming from his wife prevented his mind from focusing. Michael covered his ears and thought hard. Their eyes were red, but not all of the time, they were only red when, when.
“They had fangs.” Michael spoke out loud.
“What was that honey?” Susan said cheerfully as she put a plate of pancakes down in front of Michael, “Eat up before it gets cold!”
Fangs! Michael thought what type of person, doesn’t go out in daylight, doesn’t eat, and has red eyes and fangs? A slow realisation came over him, as he realised that no person would, correction no human person would. Could it be true or was his mind playing tricks. Could it be that a creature of myth and fantasy really existed? Could his wonderful, beautiful Merrill really be a..a..
“Vampire?” Words fell from his mouth again.
“Vampires? Are you turning to horror writing now? Just don’t let Chloe read it, I don’t want her to have nightmares!” Michael glared at his wife’s back as she turned round to get even more condiments from the kitchen cupboards. How much could one man put on a few pancakes? But that was not important right now. Merrill was a vampire, and that answered so many questions. Like how she had kept him at arm’s length, trying to protect him from her world of darkness, how romantic. Perhaps that man that took her away was the vampire that, what was the correct term? ‘Made’ her into a vampire? He would certainly stand to reason as to why Merrill had left with him. But Merrill, vampire or not, loved Michael, she had proven that when she had pleaded for his life, and Michael still loved her. And he would become a vampire to be with her, and take her away from her, her ‘maker’? His mind tumbled through all the vampire legends he had encountered, trying to familiarise himself with the life he was about to lead. Being a vampire would mean he would have to drink human blood, it would mean he would have to kill. The thought of killing had never bothered him much, how close had he come to killing before? A rush of adrenaline came back to haunt him, tease him of all those moments when he had thoughts of killing others. Being a vampire would come easy to him.
“Michael, you’re not eating, what’s wrong with you? You haven’t said a word all morning? You had better snap out of it before Chloe comes down!” Michael looked up at his wife standing over him, hands on hips, an impatient look in her hazel eyes, her blonde hair tied messily in a ponytail, her apron covered in flour, and he hated her.
“What can’t you be more like Merrill?” Michael spoke to her venom in his voice. His wife stood momentarily puzzled by her husbands’ question.
“Merrill? Who the hell is Merrill?” She demanded. Michael slid of the bar stool and stood up, slowly moving towards his wife.
“She is the love of my life and I will not let you stop me from being happy anymore.”
“Oh my god! You’ve been having an affair?”
“Yes, and we want to be together forever.” His wife was looking at him like he was speaking a foreign language; she was obviously under the impression that he loved her, and not Merrill. But how could anyone love someone who was as irritating as her.
“No.” Her voice was edged with tears. “No, no you can’t do this.” Her mind slowly processing what was happening. “Why are you doing this? Haven’t I been a good wife?” Her questions were annoying him. He moved towards what was fast becoming a gibbering wreck before his eyes. Michael picked up the large kitchen knife before he even registered that he had seen it out of the corner of his eye. “What are you doing? Put the knife down Michael, you’re scaring me.” Michael smiled he couldn’t believe his wife was still talking.
“You’re a nagging, stupid dog and I hate you. You’ve stop me from being all I could be, but not anymore. I’m going to be powerful, and live forever.”
“Michael, what are you talking about? Are you crazy?” His wife began to see the insanity burning in her husbands’ eyes, and started to edge backwards, away from the knife in his hands.
“No, for the first time in my life, my mind is clear, and I know what I have to do in order to be happy. You see, I met a vampire, the most beautiful being on earth, and we will be together. I’m going to be a vampire.”
“You’re talking crazy.” She wife pleaded as she backed into the kitchen counter. “Please Michael, don’t do this.” But her words fell on deaf ears as Michael brought the knife down on her chest. Susan sank to the floor, her hand on her chest where she had been stabbed. She looked at her palm covered in blood. “Michael.” She whispered, but Michael merely answered by plunging the knife into his wife again and again in a frenzy, falling on his knees, enjoying the motion of every stab. But all too soon the pleasure was over; his wife was no longer struggling to move away from him, she just lay there, useless in death as she had been in life. He put the knife down on the floor, and slowly moved his hands over her body, his fingers found one of the wounds caused by the knife. Blood trickled from the cut; slowly he dug his fingers into the hole, feeling the squelch of blood oozing out. His lifted his hand to see his fingers covered in deep dark rich blood, his new food source, he moved his fingers to his mouth, and sucked at them. Not half bad, he thought, he could get to like this.
“Daddy!” The excited voice of a seven year old girl came from behind Michael; he turned to be faced with the child version of his wife. Chloe stood there in her pink pyjamas, teddy bear in hand, and a huge smile on her face. She moved forward to embrace her father, but stopped suddenly, with her expression turning from happiness to puzzlement at the scene before her.
“What’s wrong with mummy?” The child moved her gaze from the form of her mother on the floor to her father, her hazel eyes developing a fearful edge. She tucked the teddy bear under one arm, and started to play with her blonde hair. “Daddy, why is mummy on the floor?”
Michael looked at his daughter, and felt nothing, except maybe a slight disgust that his child could resemble his wife so much. He had no need for a child in his life with Merrill. He picked up the knife.
“Daddy?”
Marty woke up from a pleasant days sleep; he stretched out in his coffin, and rubbed his eyes. Memories of the night previous came flooding back, and he realised he was alone and that wasn’t right. Did he dream that Merrill was sleeping in his coffin with him? No he was pretty certain that had been real, as was everything else that night, he smiled. Merrill must have slipped awake before sunset, so as not to get caught being with him; a slight feeling of hurt crept over him, of rejection. Merrill still didn’t want to be associated with him in that way, she still wasn’t over Drew. His smile faded, and he threw back the lid of his coffin with his telekinesis, and sat up in a huff. He looked over at the other two coffins in the dorm, already open, indicating he was the last to get up.
“Who’d have thought Merrill would pull at a writer’s workshop?” Karl joked as he sat, leaning back in his chair, feet up on the table and sipping at his blood pack through a straw.
“Who’d have thought Merrill could pull?” Essie said a smirk on her face. Drew sat there silent, a dark expression on his face. The three vampires sat around the master table in the centre of the room, having breakfast.
“Murdoch’s not going to be happy if she wants to start dating a mortal.” Drew said rather sulkily.
“But it’s different with Merrill, she’s the most human of all of us, she’d be fine dating a human, I can’t see her losing it and feasting on him.” Karl mused.
“Then that’s double standards, why is it ok for Merrill but not for me?” Drew whined.
“What’s ok for Merrill?” Marty said wandering in, standing behind Karl.
“To date a human.” Karl said leaning back even further in his chair to look at an upside down Marty.
“What?” Marty stood amazed at what he was hearing, either he had dreamt everything that had happened in the last 24 hours or he had woken up into an alternative universe.
“Yeah, some guy drops round just after sunset with flowers for her.” Karl continued, sitting back upright in his chair. Alarm bells started ringing somewhere in the back of Marty’s mind, as he leaned on the back of Karl’s chair.
“Some guys really do know how to romance a girl.” Essie added, “Murdoch’s up with them now, I think he said his name was Mark or something.” Karl shook his head.
“No it wasn’t Mark, it was...”
“Michael.” Marty cut Karl off.
“Yeah, that was...” Karl turned round to see Marty fully vamped out, eyes blazing red, and fangs bared.
“Come on,” Marty was moved quickly to their cellar exit, he paused only to see the puzzled look on his fellow vampires faces, “They’re in danger.” It only took Marty a second if that to reach Murdoch’s office. No-one was there, until a mere second later he was joined by Drew, Essie and Karl.
“What’s going...” Marty cut Drew off with a single look, and all four listened hard to the voices that were coming from the Foyer just outside Murdoch’s office. Quietly they moved to the doorway, peeking out to see what was going on, yet despite seeing with their own eyes they did not believe what they saw.
Dr Murdoch knelt on the floor, his head bowed, not daring to move; desperately trying to think a way out of the situation. Murdoch thought he had every situation covered but this scenario was completely unexpected, for once he had no idea of what to do. Michael stood leaning over his prey, a revolver to the Dr’s head; yet his dead gaze was fixed upon another, Merrill, his Merrill, tears rolling down her face, hugging herself and shaking with fear.
“Come on my love, don’t listen to him, I will keep you safe forever if you let me; make me into a vampire and no-one has to die here.” Michael spoke gently, it was obvious Merrill wanted to make him into a vampire but she was so scared of this Murdoch guy, and no doubt her ‘maker’. He hadn’t expected to be confronted by a human in the process of this, at least he was pretty sure this Murdoch was human, but it had served his purpose, he now had leverage to use against Merrill’s maker. This human obviously protected them during the day, and therefore was valuable to them.
“Merrill, listen to me, don’t do it, this guy is insane, imagine what he would be like as a vampire.” Murdoch paused his speech as the barrel of the gun was jabbed into the back of his head.
“Shut-up!” Michael hissed, “Merrill, please come with me, we can have a wonderful life together, I can rescue you from this place.”
Merrill thought hard, it seemed like an impossible choice, if she didn’t turn Michael into a vampire he would shoot Murdoch, but if she did, the consequences would be devastating. A soul that empty, that insane, could easy become a powerful vampire, someone who would join the Fury, someone who would kill and live true to the vampire lore of old. Could Merrill create a killer in order to save her teacher? Which was the lesser evil? One mortal’s life to save countless others, or save one life at the expense of how many? Merrill could not stop the tears, she was frightened, frightened of the situation, frightened of the consequences of her choice, frightened that she would not be able to do what the experiment asked her to do. She heard Murdoch’s words, and yet she could not obey them. She had to save her teacher; Merrill allowed her fangs to grow.
“No, Merrill, don’t.” Marty whispered, willing her to stop.
“Why doesn’t she just attack him, the gun won’t hurt her, he obviously hasn’t read up on his vampire folklore.” Karl said in a hushed tone to Essie.
“She’s protecting Murdoch.” Essie answered
“And for those of you that haven’t been shot before, it bloody hurts!” Hissed Marty, “We need to get him to take the gun off Murdoch; then we can rush him.”
“How are we going to do that?” Drew said, “What’s the plan?”
“We give him another target.” Marty said, “Wait for my signal.” Before anyone could stop him, Marty had moved into the centre of the foyer.
“Well hey there Micky, isn’t this a nice reunion.” Marty said with full vigour as loud and obnoxiously as he could.
“Marty.” Merrill cried out Marty read the panic in Merrills’ eyes, and willed her to read his mind.
“Come on Merrill,” he said under his breath, “get with the plan.” Marty’s red gaze stayed on Merrill, watching every motion her face made, then suddenly he saw it, that little nod of recognition. “Hitting me with a car didn’t work so you trying bullets instead? Let me tell ya a little secret, that won’t either.” He watched Merrill grab Michael’s arm as if she was afraid. It worked; Michael moved his focus momentarily on to Merrill, and then back on to Marty. He was buying the fact that Merrill was afraid of Marty, and that Marty was a threat.
“It’s ok my love, I won’t let him take you again, you’re mine now.”
“Really,” said Marty taking a step forward, Michael instinctively moved the gun from Murdoch to point it at Marty. Marty smiled as he slowly raised his hands. “I don’t think you will take her, I won’t let you, she is under my control, my power.” Michael used his free hand to grab at Merrill, holding her firmly by the waist.
“Save me from him.” She whispered to Michael, she had to make him believe she wanted to go with him. Michael smiled, and lowered his gun; he tilted his head to one side, he was not afraid of this vampire, and he was going to prove it.
Casually he let go of Merrill and moved the gun into his left hand, stepping away from his beloved, he decide to call this Marty’s bluff, to see exactly how much he cared for Merrill. Slowly Michael raised the gun, and pointed it at Merrill. Marty’s eyes widen slightly, what was this crazy human doing? Was he testing Marty to see if he would let them go to save Merrills life? She wasn’t in danger of dying but Marty didn’t want Merrill to get shot either, and he doubted very much that Michael would shoot her, but he couldn’t risk it, he had to get Michael to be scared of him, so he would be his target should the gun go off. Marty scanned the room, and saw the light switch, using his telekinesis he began to turn the lights on and off. Michael merely rolled his eyes, at the parlour trick.
“Let her go!” Marty growled, sending a few vases flying across the room.
“If she’s so important to you, you’re gonna let us leave right now, and no-one has to die.” Michael bargained. Marty smiled at the thought of someone trying to kill a vampire with bullets, but knew he wouldn’t risk Merrill getting even the slightest bit hurt. Marty concentrated harder lifting Michael a few inches off the floor. That got his attention. Marty saw panic in the human’s eyes; he saw the gun barrel move away from Merrill.
“Now!” Marty yelled as he took a few paces towards the hovering Michael. Three shadows darted across the room. Michael felt a force push him into the wall behind, then all was dark; but not before he managed to lift the gun and squeeze the trigger.
Essie helped Murdoch to stand, his knees were still shaky but he was unharmed.
“Thank you Essie.” He said, Essie looked over Murdoch’s shoulder at Karl, letting an unconscious Michael drop to the floor, blood smeared on the wall, and now trickling from his head, where the impact had occurred, and past him to Drew holding a quivering Merrill.
“Hey it worked, good plan man.” Karl called to Marty. He looked over to where Marty had been standing but saw nothing. Karl dropped his gaze to the floor; Marty lay there flat on his back, not moving. “Oh ha ha, very funny Marty, now get up.” But Marty did not move, a puzzled looked crossed all the vampires faces.
“Marty come on, this isn’t funny.” Drew called over. But there was still no reply; no sudden movement of the dead body to try and surprise them; no sick joke.
“Why is there so much blood on the floor?” Karl asked quietly, gazing at the pool of blood forming around the body on the floor. Murdoch scrambled over to where the gun had been dropped and expertly opened the cartridge, and emptied the chambers of their rounds. There in his hands the light reflected off the bullets.
“Silver.” He whispered.
So I hope you enjoyed and Part 2 is almost finished and I will post it soon - promise
xx
So this is my first ever fanfic I've written, let alone been brave enough to post somewhere. Please be gentle!
Disclaimer: I know nothing about copyright laws, but I do know that I don't own any of the characters, or the original genius idea of vampire high, so please don't sue me!
Warning: There are a few swear words in this, so I'm sorry If I offend anyone, its just that oh bother, blimey or crikey just didn't cut it at that particular moment in the story.
Right here we go...
When the great eclipse plunged the world into darkness; the vampire race erupted into a civil war. The blood-thirsty Fury battled with the enlightened Elders for domination of the un-dead. In desperation the Elders gathered up those young vampires that could be saved and entrusted them to me, to humanise them, to tame their instincts and teach them how to live amongst mortals.
Dr R Murdoch
The vampiress sat alone in her hotel room cross-legged on the bed, patiently waiting for sunset, shortly after which, she would meet the others in the lobby and go out for dinner. Tomorrow was the last day of the writing workshop, and then Merrill could go back to the Mansbridge Academy and the experiment, her home. She thought back to the boarding school, where she and four other vampires were being taught to live as human and to curb their killing instinct. Dr Murdoch, head of the school had been so impressed with her progress in learning about human society, that he had suggested that she take this course. A task which her mentor thought would help her get in touch with human emotion, allowing her to blend in to human society easier and Merrill was happy to have been given this chance to develop her writing skills. Never-the-less after a week of pretending to be human she was tired; living on a day schedule was not easy. There was the constant worry of standing too close to the windows, or making excuses for not going outside during the day, the everlasting temptation of fresh blood all around her. Unable to sleep at night and not allowed to sleep during the day, Merrill had not slept in a week and was feeling low on energy. Merrill looked down at the short piece of poetry in her lap and read over it again hoping it would be good enough for the presentation tomorrow. The task was to write a short poem about unrequited love, it seemed easy enough when she sat down to write about her fellow vampire Drew, his angular face, that dark hair, deep sensuous eyes, how she had thought he was the one, but he was not interest in her. Drew only seemed to like mortals, first Sherry, and now he seemed to have taken to the red-headed girl, Dillan. She looked in the mirror at her reflection, glad it was only a myth that vampires didn’t have reflections. She looked at herself, her thin body, her long brown hair framing her usually pale face now covered in make-up, giving the illusion she was human and actually alive, would Drew fall for her now?
She read through the poem and knew that it wasn’t about her unrequited love for Drew; it was about Marty’s love for her. It was no use denying that she and Marty had grown closer since that weekend they were alone, and the sacrifice he had made for her. Left without access to their blood packets, both she and Marty had faced withdrawal and hunger like they had never known before. He had helped her fight the temptation to feed off a human student, and risked his own life, allowing her to drink from him, so that she could live, trusted her not to take too much allowing him to live. There seemed to be hidden depths to Marty, a secret he seemed only willing to share with her, and that made her feel special. Could unrequited love ever be resolved? She looked at the end of her poem and knew the answer. The knock on the door made her jump; she had been lost in her thoughts. Gingerly she got up off the bed, and peaked through the curtains, it was dark, it was safe. The door was knocked again.
“I’m coming.” She said as she picked up her purse, and headed for the door. She opened it to find a man in his mid-thirties, Michael, standing there. He smiled at her with his big brown eyes, light brown hair flopping across his left eye. Merrill suppressed a shudder, and stopped herself from picking up any stray thoughts that might escape his mind, for once she didn’t want to be able to read minds, this man gave her the creeps.
“Ready to go?” He asked her, Merrill merely nodded her head.
The Mansbridge Academy loomed quiet and picturesque in the dim light of the early evening, home to boarding students during the school year; its dorms lay empty during the summer months. The secret dorms in the cellar though were a different matter, they were still inhabited.
Marty Strickland lay in his coffin, excitement growing in the pit of his stomach, Merrill would be home tomorrow night and he had his plan to figure out. He would get her a gift and tell her how much he missed her being around and...and...and he was hungry. He paused his thoughts, focusing on his need for blood. Quickly he moved out of his coffin and into the general living area where the others were also waiting for their blood allotments.
“So Merrill’s back tomorrow night?” Karl asked, tossing his football from hand-to-hand. “Maybe we could get a game going, girls against boys? We should make the most of the day schoolers not being here.”
“ I’ll have to share my dorm again.” Groaned Essie. The blonde vampire had been enjoying using the extra space to hang up her new clothes and shoes she had been buying over the internet. She wondered whether she could persuade Merrill to go live in one of the empty day schoolers rooms for the summer, after all she would be used to living like a human by now.
“Be honest Essie, you’ve missed having her around.” Drew reflected, looking up from his poetry book.
“Haven’t we all.” Essie said with a knowing glance at Marty as he collected his blood pack.
“What?” He asked.
“Nothing.” Essie replied. Marty looked at Essie, it must be female intuition he thought, unless she and Merrill were closer than he thought. But then again hadn’t they all got closer to each other, even he and Drew could now stand to be in the same room. He drank his blood thoughtfully, and the idea came to him.
“Is Murdoch still up?” He asked the others as he moved towards the steps that lead up out of the cellar and into the foresaid office, not waiting for a reply.
The secret entrance was open, and Marty stood hesitantly in the door, watching the dark haired middle-aged man, dressed in his normal tweed suit, write in his journal, behind his big antique desk.
Reginald Murdoch felt a presence in the room, but did not look up; he knew it was one of his night students. Instead he finished the sentence he was writing. Shutting the book, and replacing the fountain pen in its stand he looked up at the vampire, standing so unusually quiet and shy in the doorway. Blood pack in hand, only half drunk; Marty looked at Dr Murdoch with thoughtful blue eyes.
“What can I do for you Marty?” Dr Murdoch asked.
“Can I ask a favour?” Marty said without moving. Dr Murdoch lifted a hand gesturing Marty to take a seat at his desk.
“You can ask.” Marty moved from the doorway and took the seat. He shifted his weight in the chair, obviously uncomfortable with the situation, nervously sipping at his blood pack until it was gone. Marty sat staring at the empty packet in his hands, carefully choosing his words; he didn’t want to mess this up and he didn’t want to appear like a big sap either. “What is it Marty?” Dr Murdoch asked in a sympathetic voice. Marty looked up and took a deep breath.
“Are you sure you won’t take me up on my offer?” Michael asked as the final seminar of the conference broke up. “It seems silly for you to hang around here for the next few hours waiting for the night bus, when I have to drive right by Mansbridge.” Merrill was running out of excuses to refuse the lift home that he was offering her. In truth she hadn’t even thought about the fact that it was still daytime, and that she would burst into flames if she went out now, the only reason that she did not want to take Michael up on his offer was because she didn’t feel safe with him.
Michael, a husband and a father, cheerful, kind and always considerate, seemed to be liked by everyone at the writer’s workshop. Everyone except Merrill. Her mind reading abilities had shown her what truly lay beneath the surface of that angelic face, and it scared her. She almost laughed at the fact that a vampire who was strong enough to kill this man in mere seconds was afraid of him. Merrill had always thought that vampires were inherently evil, but Michael had proved to her that humans could be just as evil. Merrill had at first, refused to use her powers to read the minds of her fellow human class mates, but after days of catching Michael looking at her out of the corner of his eye, and the effort he made to be closer to her and physically touch her, she couldn’t resist a peak. His thoughts were lustful and disgusting, almost predatory in nature, the beginnings of an obsession. From then on Merrill had tried to limit her contact with him, but to no avail, and now she stood before him, petrified that he might be able to talk her into taking the three hour car journey with him back home.
“I’ll wait until after dark, if you want, I know you have a condition that means you are sensitive to the sunlight.” His voice was gently full of care and concern.
“No really, you should be getting home to your wife and daughter, I bet you miss them.” The mere mention of his family brought a darkness across his eyes for just a moment, a mumbled ‘yeah’ in response. Then suddenly his smile was back.
“Well it was really nice to meet you Merrill.” Michael kissed her on the cheek and hugged her. He was stronger than he looked, and the hug was uncomfortably tight. “I hope we meet again my dear Merrill.” He whispered into her ear. The hug was ended and he picked up his bag, “Maybe I’ll stop by Mansbridge one day and say hi.” His normal smile plastered on his face as he moved to say good bye to the remaining delegates leaving Merrill to shrink into the shadows and wait until dark.
Merrill sat with her head against the window pane, the rhythmic humming of the buses engine sending her into a half sleep. Her thoughts drifted into fantasy. She was sitting at a table set up for a meal for two, out on the patio in the moonlight. Merrill sat waiting for him, her long white dress glowing in the darkness, long brown hair hanging in a plait down her back, the blood red lipstick accenting the paleness of her face. Music drifted softly on the night breeze, setting a romantic air to the setting. Suddenly his silhouette was in the doorway, tall and manly against the harshness of the light from inside. He moved forward out onto the patio; she could see the black tie outfit he was wearing causing a stirring of excitement in her. He moved out around the edge of the patio, his face hidden by the darkness, as he moved round behind her. She felt his gentle hands on her shoulders softly massaging her neck. Merrill felt his breath as he leant in close; she waited to hear Drew’s voice.
“Merrill, you are my One”. The voice said but it wasn’t Drew’s, it was Marty’s.
Merrill sat bolt upright in her seat, her eyes awake and open. She consciously looked around her, thankful that the few other people on the bus all seemed to be asleep. Was she really just dreaming about Marty in that way? But deep down she knew that wasn’t the first time her dreams of Drew had morphed into dreams of Marty. Could she really be starting to get over Drew? She had been trying for months, and finally it seemed to be happening. But to fall for Marty instead? As Essie had so eloquently put it he was a manipulator, a liar, a short attention grabbing clown, someone whose only way of connecting with others was to hurt them. But was that really the true Marty? Merrill knew that if there was a joke to be made at the expense of another, he was the one who made it. Marty was the one with all the snide remarks and always trying to pick a fight but in the end she had thought that he was all noise and no action. However, there were those times when he had surprised her. That time he had helped her when Dr Murdoch was ill, there was nothing in it for him, and of course that weekend when he had allowed her to feed on him, risking his own life. She pictured him in her mind, his jet black hair sticking up all over the place, his lean body and chiselled cheek bones, his cheeky smile. The way he could make her smile, like when they had danced, and when she had played the piano and he had sung. Merrill couldn’t suppress the smile that had begun to spread across her face, she bit her nail nervously. Marty had been so sweet to her, understanding that she was hurting over Drew, and saying that it was ok. That wasn’t the Marty he displayed to the others, only to her, was he genuine? She knew that he was, her mind –reading abilities had proven that. But they were total opposites, how could it work? It was ridiculous. She straighten the smile from her face, and was resolute that she had no feelings for him, but even as she did she couldn’t help but remember how nice it had felt when he had massaged her back, and the smile returned. What was it had said to her, if you can’t be with the one you love, love the one you’re with; Merrill leant her head back onto the window pane and thought about her poem, was a vampire truly capable of loving another?
The bus pulled into the station only a few miles away from Mansbridge. Merrill hoped that Dr Murdoch was already there, she desperately wanted to be back at the school, a place she know felt was her home, with her vampiric family. She waited impatiently for the bus driver to open the baggage hold, and hand her, her suitcase. He shut the hold, and climbed back into the bus, to continue on with his journey. Merrill moved through the car park, her coat wrapped around her slender body, suitcase in hand, looking for life in the darkness of the very early hours of the morning. She saw the car she knew belonged to Dr Murdoch, and although she couldn’t believe what she saw, she couldn’t stop herself from smiling.
He was just sitting there, on the bonnet of the car, his dark hair sticking up all over the place, like he had been given an electric shock, the sunglasses he worn accentuated the paleness of his face, which seemed to glow in the dim light of the car park lighting. He wore all black, painting the typical image of a vampire, leather trousers and a black jumper beneath his long leather jacket. He was just sitting there a huge smile on his face and a blood red rose between his teeth. He was hitting on her again, and for once Merrill didn’t mind.
He sat in his car, not far from the scene. He watched the guy jump off the bonnet of the car and walk up to her. He had handed her a flower of some kind, probably a rose, and she had actually allowed him to hug her! But he knew Merrill was just being kind, she would never betray him, but if she wouldn’t tell this stranger to back off he would, she was too nice, too fragile, she needed him to protect her. He saw the way the young man with the long flowing coat and stupid hair fail to move away from Merrill, staying in close proximity, how he frequently stroked her arm as they chatted. He would kill that man; nothing would keep him away from his Merrill. He stayed still as he watched the stupid young man with sunglasses on at night take her suitcase, and lead her to the car, opening the door of the car to allow her to get in, then shutting the door, he moved round the back of the car, tossing her suitcase carelessly into the boot of the car, and finally himself getting in the driver’s side. The car sprung into life, and it moved out the car park. Michael didn’t like this guy, he was endangering his Merrill, not only was he wearing sunglasses at night, he had failed to turn on his car head lights! Michael started his car engine and followed them out of the car park.
“Why did that driver flash his head lights at me?” Marty whined from behind the wheel, as he took another country road corner a little faster than Merrill would have liked.
“Perhaps because you haven’t put the cars headlights on.” Merrill said as nicely as she could, whilst holding onto her seat edges.
“Oh.” Marty said and immediately turned the lights on. “Well it’s not like a need them to see in the dark.”
“No, but it does help the other human drivers to see you.” Merrill accented the human to make her point. Marty looked at her and smiled that smile of his, showing his pearly white teeth, without fangs. She shook her head. “Marty, slow down you’re going to miss the...” She stopped her pointless sentence as the car drove past the turn off for the school. “We were suppose to take that left turn to get to the school.”
“Yeah, but we’re not going to school.” Marty stated matter-of-factly, he glanced quickly at Merrill and saw the nervous, worried and slightly frightened face he was expecting. “Don’t worry; I’ve cleared it with Murdoch.”
“Where are we going?” Merrill asked anxiously, she was tired and wasn’t up to one of Marty’s practical jokes.
“Check out the back seat.” Marty nodded his head backwards and he kept his focus on the road. She looked over her shoulder and saw a picnic basket and blanket. That smile grew on her face again.
“Shouldn’t they be back by now?” Drew said as he looked at the clock in Murdoch’s office. It was almost 5 o’clock. Essie went to answer, but was interrupted by Karl running into the office.
“I can’t find Marty anywhere, so I guess it’s just the three of us for cards then.” He shrugged as he pulled up a chair next to Essie.
“Oh I wouldn’t worry about them. Marty will be around somewhere, and Merrill will be back shortly,” She said as she shuffled the cards.
“I reckon Merrill’s loved acting all human this week. I bet she could even make a living from writing and live in the human world easily. Do you think she’ll be the first to leave here?” Karl asked as he looked at the cards Essie had dealt him. Essie sat thoughtfully.
“Well, at least as a writer, she wouldn’t have to go out during the day; she could be one of those weird recluse writers.” She replied.
“What job would you do out in the human world Essie?” Karl asked
“Oh Karl, that’s easy, I’d be a fashion designer. Sleep all day, party all night, all those fabulous clothes and shoes!”
“What about you Drew?” Karl turned to Drew as he sat at the table and picked up his cards.
“Vampires don’t need jobs.” He said sulkily, looking at his hand.
“Yeah, but if we are successful in this project and we go out and live in human society, it would seem slightly odd if we didn’t have a job.” Stated Essie.
“Do you reckon I could do something in sports?” Karl asked.
Drew looked at the clock as it chimed,
“She should be back by now; dawn will be here soon. Murdoch did go pick her up right?” He asked anxious.
“Really Drew, I shouldn’t worry.” Essie said with a knowing smile, sorting out her hand of cards in her perfected manicured hands.
“What’s that suppose to mean?” Drew pointedly asked her.
“Well let’s just say I don’t think we should bother waiting up for them.” Essie smiled as she sat poised to raise her stakes in the game ahead.
Merrill stared up at the night sky, stretched out on the blanket, she felt totally relaxed, she closed her eyes drifting into a half sleep. Marty noisily slurping at his blood pack brought her back to the here and now. She opened one eye sleepily at looked at him, lying next to her, staring at her.
“So tell me more.” He begged. Merrill fully opened both eyes and sat up, Marty copying her movements.
“What do you want to know?”
“Did you eat actual food? Or alcohol?” Merrill grimaced as she remembered that first evening she had gone out to dinner. She had eaten too much food for someone who hadn’t eaten food in years, probably decades. That night, she had had terrible stomach cramps.
“My stomach didn’t like too much food, so I only ate little amounts of light foods, like salads, or raw meats, or as raw as I could get.” She laughed as she remembered the thoughts of her fellow classmates at the workshop. “They all thought I was on some weird diet or anorexic or something. Actually most of them thought I was a hypochondriac, with the whole not going out in sunlight thing. They all thought I was scared of getting skin cancer.” Marty sblack personed at her story.
“So Merrill, you cheated and read the minds of the other students. No wonder you did so well on the course.” Merrill gave him a playful tap of the arm.
“No, I would never read their minds for that purpose.”
“But for entertainment? So go on, tell me more, what other strange human thoughts did you pick up on?” Merrill thought back to the third night out, she had attempted to drink some wine, but it had gone straight to her head. That was when she had started to read all her fellow human classmates minds. It was that night, she had read Michael’s mind. Marty saw the smile disappear from her face, and a slight look of fear appear in her eye, her face dropped to look at her lap. “What?” He asked her, moving his hand slowly up and placing it on her shoulder, he moved his head down and tilted it up so he could look into her eyes in her downward gaze.
“There was this guy; Michael.” She spoke softly. “He...” she paused looking for the right words. “I had forgotten that humans could be monsters too.” Marty moved his hand to gently lift up her face level to his own. He had expected to see disappointment in her eyes, and perhaps a little sadness, but all he saw was horror and fear.
“What did he do?” Marty paused “Did he do anything to you?” Marty rephrased the question. Merrill shook her head.
“I’m having a lovely time Marty; I don’t want to spoil it by talking about it.” Marty nodded and moved his hand from her chin, softly stroking her cheek, before moving his hand away. He looked in to Merrills’ familiar blue eyes, he could tell he was moving closer to her, and she wasn’t moving away, the urge to kiss her was so strong. Marty hesitated, he wasn’t sure he could take her pushing him away again, he’d lost count how many times he had been close to kissing her when she had cruelly shoved him away, or even smashed a vase on his head. Merrill felt a sense of déjà vu; like she had been this close to kissing Marty before, like she had kissed Marty before and wanted to do so, but couldn’t place the event. Was he going to kiss her now? After what seemed like an eternity, Marty slowly edged forward, placing a hand on Merrills’ thigh. Merrill closed her eyes, an excitement stirring in her that she had not felt since Drew had broken her heart.
Merrills’ eye flew open at the sound. Marty pulled away and began fumbling in his jacket pocket.
“What’s that beeping?” She asked, as Marty pulled a mobile phone out of his pocket and began to angrily punch the keypad. The phone went silent. Marty half laughed, half snorted as he sat staring at the phone in his hands, he had to laugh or else he’d cry. How cliché he thought. He held the phone up in the air so that Merrill could see it.
“Alarm, to tell us dawn’s on its way. We have just enough time to pack up and get back to school before we fry.” Merrill had picked up on his thoughts, and had to agree it was a total cliché, and smiled at him.
“I suppose we had better go then.” She said. They stood up, Merrill picked up the empty blood packs that lay scattered around them. Marty picked up the blanket, screwing it up into a ball and stuffing it as best he could into the basket. Simultaneously they went to pick up the basket their heads almost knocking into each other, their hands touched, electricity sparked the air again as they looked at each other, their lips only inches apart.
Michael sat behind the wheel of his car, its engine off; its lights dark. An anger, a hatred building inside of him, and yet he could still not believe Merrill was betraying him like this, after all they had shared, all their moments, all those dinners. No it was this stranger, this silly boy. He watched the scene in front of him until he couldn’t take it anymore.
Marty couldn’t believe he was actually kissing Merrill, and there was no sensation of him flying backward as she fended him off. Could she be teasing him again? No that was a one-off, that wasn’t her, the real her anyway. This was real, this was actually happening. The basket dropped to the floor as his arms moved to embrace her. Her hands were in his hair and it felt so good, he was so lost in the moment that he first he put the faint growling sound down to nothingness, but the sound got louder and closer. He tried hard to gather his thoughts and place the sound that was coming towards him; this couldn’t be a dream, could it? Sense overcame his desire and he opened one eye to check his surroundings. It was only then when he saw it coming at them at speed that his could place the sound of the noise to a car engine heading straight for them. His instinct kicked in and for the only time ever, he promised himself, he pushed Merrill as far anyway from him as he could. Although it all must have happened in a few seconds, everything was in slow motion. He saw Merrill fly through the air and land on her back at least 100 yards away, then he turned and saw the bright headlights of the car, only yards away from him, and then he too felt the sensation of flying through the air.
The coldness of the water brought Marty out of his stupor. What the hell was going on?
Michael slammed on his brakes hard and got out of the car. He must have killed that guy; he was nearly going 60 miles an hour. He heard Merrills’ voice screaming Mikey, his name. Michael felt the warm glow of love in his stomach; she had a pet name for him. She needed him; she needed him to help her, save her from her attacker. He turned and saw her lying on the floor trying to get up, he ran over to help his damsel.
“Marty!” Merrill screamed his name over and over. “Marty!” She tried to get up, but she couldn’t will her body to move, what was happening? She was so overwhelmed at kissing Marty she didn’t realise he had pushed her away until she saw him get hit by the light. The light, what was that? She felt herself being pulled up roughly and hugged tightly. Where was Marty? This couldn’t be him; the light had pushed him away. Merrill pulled herself away from the person hugging her and looked into their eyes and everything became clear. There was no mistaking those eyes, those cold, hard, dead, insane eyes. Michael.
Marty staggered out of the water, thrashing with the reeds. He was drenched, cold, and disorientated. Why was he outside, why was he in a lake, why wasn’t he at Mansbridge? The scream ringing through the early dawn brought him back to his senses. Merrill. Marty looked up and saw her being dragged to a car, by, by a human? That couldn’t be right. Marty mused at the situation in front of him. Why wasn’t Merrill attacking him, feeding on him, killing him?
Fear overwhelmed Merrill; it was like she was having a quivering all over again, another premonition of her own death. Why was she so afraid of this human, she should be fighting him, killing him, but that was wrong, she couldn’t do that anymore. The human was speaking to her, telling her to get in the car, but she didn’t want to. Her body was heavy, she couldn’t move from her kneeling position. Why was he doing this, he was human, and he should be afraid of her, a vampire. Very afraid. Merrills’ demon instinct started to kick in.
Michael couldn’t make sense of the situation, what was wrong with Merrill, why didn’t she want to come with him? He had just saved her from an attacker, surely she should be grateful, and would want to be his forever now; perhaps she was in shock. He took hold of her roughly by her shoulders and looked into her face, but her eyes weren’t the same cool beautiful blue sapphires they should be, they were red rubies, angry looking. And there was something wrong with her mouth. What was happening to her? His preoccupation with Merrills’ new look prevented him of seeing or even sensing the shadow that was moving towards him with speed and force. The pain as his back hit the side of his car was only secondary to the pain of his throat as he struggled to breath.
Marty held the pathetic human by the throat with one hand, his feet dangling a few inches from the floor. He would crush the life out of this lesser being. Anger held Marty in its grasp, and he was enjoying feeling like a god again, what was one more human life, he had taken plenty over the centuries. This one deserved it.
Merrill looked at Marty, water dripping from his body, his eyes red, his fangs out. Slowly strangling Michael, part of Merrill wanted to Marty to continue, to protect her, but she repressed it down to where her deepest darkest thoughts were banished, this was not the human way, this was not what the experiment had taught them to do.
“Marty, stop. You’re killing him.” She pleaded her eyes blue, her fang withdrawn.
“Why should I? Is this him? Is this Michael?” There was no reply, “Merrill answer me.” Marty roared at her, turning his blood red gaze upon her form kneeing meekly on the ground.
“Yes, but think of the experiment, think of everything we have learnt; of what we are trying to become, you do this and you’re back to square one.”
“Maybe I don’t care, doesn’t he deserve it?”
“We don’t have the right to play judge and executioner. He has a family, a little girl. ”
“Which he obviously cares nothing about or else he’d be with them.”
The night sky had become noticeable lighter, dawn was coming, and another panic and fear overcame Merrill.
“Marty, the sun, we must get back.” She stood up pulling at the arm that was holding Michael in the air. Marty peered over his shoulder to the east and saw the dawn coming, and realised he was out of time, if he was to live another night. He roughly dropped Michael to the floor and grabbed Merrill by the hand and together they moved at speed to their own car parked a little way ahead of them.
Michael sat on the grass dazed and confused, rubbing his throat, rasping in all the air his lungs could hold. Why had they just left like that? How had they moved so quickly, what was wrong with their eyes, and their mouths? Michael tried to focus his thoughts, they had run away from the dawn, and Merrill had refused to go out in the daylight. For some unknown reason he thought back to the dinners at the conference, the way Merrill had only eaten meat, and very raw meat, how he had once seen her, when she didn’t know he was watching, drink some red liquid from a packet. And that guy had been so very strong. Then finally, he realised what was wrong with their mouths, what his mind had refused to acknowledge before. They had fangs.
Marty raced through the deserted streets of the early morning. He could already feel the early morning rays prickle his skin. He slapped the steering wheel angrily.
“I should have just snapped his neck.” Marty slapped the steering wheel hard again. Merrill stayed quiet processing what had happened. “We are vampires Merrill, we should have just killed him, we are gods.”
“You sound like your part of the Fury.” Merrill whispered quietly. Marty slapped the steering hard one last time, and then sighed. He turned to look at Merrill, meek little Merrill trying so hard to be human. Merrill looked at Marty; she noticed his eyes had turned back to normal. Marty caught her gaze, and looked back at the road.
“I just wanted to protect you.” He whispered.
“I know.” Merrill moved her hand and placed it on the steering wheel on top of Marty’s and gave it a squeeze. The moment was there again, just like it had been before the alarm had gone off, and Michael had driven into them. Suddenly there was no fear, no panic, just calm.
A flash of light from the first rays of the sun peaking over the horizon bounced off the window.
“nuts, hold on.” Marty slammed his foot down hard on the accelerator, and turned hard on to the private road, towards the Mansbridge academy. They only had moments left; both of them could feel their skin start to itch; then came the first prickles of a burning sensation. Marty screeched to halt outside the main door, and the pair got out of the car as fast as they could. Marty opened the door, just as the sun came at full force over the horizon. The two vampires dived inside, and shut the door, shutting out the light with the thick cool wood. They leant panting for breath, the coldness of the door soothing their skin.
“Ever feel like your life is one long sitcom?” Marty asked with a weak smile.
Marty pushed his hair back, letting the water flatten it to his head. The shower was cold, perfect for soothing his skin. He washed off the grimy pond water and felt better. What a night. He let his mind wander back through the centuries, nope, he really couldn’t think of a time when he had a night like this. But he had kissed Merrill, properly, well at least for a second or two before anything else had gone wrong. His perfect plan was in ruins, so where did that leave him now? And what should he do about this Michael? He groaned as no answers would come to him, now was not the time for questions, they could be asked later, now was time for sleep. Marty turned off the shower, and listened. There was no sound, they had not woken anyone up with their urgent dash into the school, he was grateful; he didn’t feel like answering any of their questions right now either. He roughly dried his hair, and then tied the towel loosely around his waist and walked back to his dorm, and his coffin.
Merrill sat and listened patiently to hear his footsteps coming back from the bathroom. The soft patter of bare feet passed by her dorm, just outside the curtain she had drawn. She slid silently from her coffin, and hesitated, unsure as to whether to go see Marty. Merrill sighed and pushed her way through the curtain, and crossed the room to the boys’ dorm.
“Marty,” Merrill whispered as she pushed the curtain aside. Marty turned round to face his visitor, completely naked, his towel round his neck, as he used the ends of it to dry his ears. Merrills’ jaw hung loosely as she tried to utter some sensible words. Even in the dimness of the dorm, lit only by a candle, Marty’s smirk was un-mistakable.
“Would you mind turning around, so I could put some clothes on.” Marty whispered; there was not a chance in hell he was going to risk waking the others, and was grateful that Merrill hadn’t screamed. But she did look adorable, her mouth hanging wide open, her cheeks as pink as if she was living, Marty didn’t even realise vampires could blush.
“Of course.” Merrill stuttered as she shielded her eyes from the sight of a full frontal naked Marty, and turned her back on her fellow vampire. She cursed herself, completely embarrassed, why had seen been so eager to go see him? Marty grabbed the first pair of clean trousers he could find, and put them on, but nothing else.
“So, what can I do for you?” Even whispering the thingyiness of his voice rang loud and true. Merrill gingerly looked over her shoulder to see if Marty had put any clothes on yet, she could see that he had yet to put a shirt on but was relieved when she let her eyes wandered downwards that he had at least got trousers on and so turned round fully. Marty was standing there, arms crossed against his bare chest. His muscles weren’t as big as Karl’s, but as lean as Marty was, he was toned. Very toned.
“Merrill?” Marty’s voice brought Merrill out of her daydream. Marty looked at Merrill still stuttering for words. She had changed her clothes too; a simple black dress hung on her thin frame, her feet were bare, and she looked good without any of the make-up she was wearing to look human.
“I, erm, I,” Marty looked at her, impatience growing on his face. “Nevermind.” Merrill turned to leave, but Marty moved quickly, gently catching her arm before she left.
“Are you ok?” Marty asked now with concern evident in his voice, the irrepressible Marty had disappeared. Merrill shook her head. “I,” she exhaled, “I don’t want to be alone right now. I was wondering whether you would stay up and talk for a while.”
“Merrill you look knackered, you haven’t slept, in what, a week?” Merrill bit her nail nervously, and nodded, “it’s just...” Merrill couldn’t finish her sentence, she couldn’t explain the anxiety she was feeling, how she was scared to be alone, the stupid fear she had of this mortal coming back. Marty looked at his coffin, then back at Merrill.
“If Essie and Karl can fit into one of these coffins, then you and I will definitely be able to.” Merrill pulled her arm out of Marty’s grasp, a slight horrified look on her face.
“Whoa, don’t get me wrong, but after the night I’ve had, and the week you’ve had, we could both do with some sleep, and if you don’t want to be on your own...” Marty shrugged, and walked casually to his coffin, “I promise I won’t cop a feel.” He said holding his hands up in the air.
Merrill considered her options. She really didn’t want to be alone, and yes she was tired. Michael had un-nerved her like no one had ever done before; at least not since she was made a vampire. She thought of Marty, and how he would typically suggest that she could spend the day in his coffin with him, but she also knew that although only a few months ago the thought of doing such a thing would have repulsed her, she didn’t feel that way anymore. She watched as Marty slid into his coffin, still half naked, she knew they would be up close and personal; coffins weren’t built for two. What would the others think if they found out? What would Drew think? Merrill glanced back at the way she had come, through the curtain and into her own dorm, to where her coffin lay. She knew if she was in there alone her mind would not stop thinking and she would go another day without sleep. She turned back to Marty; lying in his coffin, propped up on one elbow; still looking at her.
Marty lay there in the darkness of his coffin, despite his tiredness he couldn’t sleep; the huge grin on his face and the body in his arms prevented him from doing so. He listened quietly to the rhythmic breathing of Merrill finally asleep on his chest. They must have whispered to each other for about an hour before conversation slowly dropped off, and shortly after so did Merrill, her exhaustion finally taking over her anxiety. They had talked about nothing important; mostly Marty had filled her in on the escapades of the group whilst she was at the conference. Speaking of normality seemed to calm her nerves allowing her to relax; Marty could physically feel her tension dissolve, as she lay off to one side of his body, her head resting on his chest. Now he was here awake alone, an excitement growing at having the prospect of Merrill trust him like she had and that this may just lead to something more than a friendship, but desperately trying not to get too excited. Despite his cold shower, he felt like he could do with another one, but there was no way he could move without disturbing Merrill. So he lay there, thinking of everything possible to cool his urges; the disturbing image of Murdoch in a pair of tight speedo’s finally dampened his desire to an ember, allowing him to enjoy the sensation of Merrill merely sleeping next to him, sending him to a peaceful dream.
Michael opened the door to his home in a daze, but it had not been the night without sleep that was his distraction. He made his way to the kitchen and sat down at his place at the breakfast bar. He looked around him. Crayon drawings were pinned to the fridge, alongside photos of him and his ‘two girls’, his wife Susan, and daughter, Chloe. The draining board was filled with washed dishes waiting to be put away, papers for recycling in a neat little stack in the corner, a calendar with numerous appointments scribbled alongside dates. He put his head in his hands, how he longed to share his life with Merrill, instead of having this one.
“Oh my god!” Michael was removed forcibly from his daydream by the shrill voice of his wife. “I didn’t think you’d be back until this afternoon, did you get up early so you could get back here to see Chloe before she went to riding? She’ll be so happy to see her daddy!” Michael was always surprised how his wife managed to be able to say so much without seeming to breathe. It irritated him. “I’ll put on some coffee for you; it looks like you need some. I’ll make some pancakes too shall I?”
Michael didn’t answer; he knew his wife would make pancakes even if he said no. He tried to block her out as she rattled around the kitchen getting the morning breakfast ready, her endless chatter about everything she and their child had done this week, during his absence. He focused on Merrill, his love. He missed her already, had it only been last night that they had hugged and sworn everlasting love to each other? No something was wrong with that picture, something his brain didn’t want to admit. That’s right, Merrill had been attacked by a stalker, and he had saved her. But if he had saved her, what was he doing back in his kitchen with his wife? That’s right, the stalker had taken Merrill from him, or had she gone with him willing? But of course she had, that was Merrill, she had gone with him to save Michaels life, that boy had been strangling him. Michael touched his throat gingerly, and felt the bruising. That was right; the damsel always makes a sacrifice for her true love; just like in fiction.
“Here you are hon.” Michael looked at the mug of coffee his wife had placed in front of him, its steam rising before his eyes. She had kissed him on the head and then had gone back to making the pancakes. Michael turned his thoughts back to Merrill; there was something different about her, and the man that had taken her away. The man had seemed eerily pale, as had Merrill that one morning, he saw her coming back to the hotel just before dawn. Dawn, why was dawn so important? Merrill was ill, she couldn’t go out in sunlight, but the man had also shown fear of the dawn. Could he too have the same illness as Merrill? There was another detail, something important; the annoying background chatter coming from his wife prevented his mind from focusing. Michael covered his ears and thought hard. Their eyes were red, but not all of the time, they were only red when, when.
“They had fangs.” Michael spoke out loud.
“What was that honey?” Susan said cheerfully as she put a plate of pancakes down in front of Michael, “Eat up before it gets cold!”
Fangs! Michael thought what type of person, doesn’t go out in daylight, doesn’t eat, and has red eyes and fangs? A slow realisation came over him, as he realised that no person would, correction no human person would. Could it be true or was his mind playing tricks. Could it be that a creature of myth and fantasy really existed? Could his wonderful, beautiful Merrill really be a..a..
“Vampire?” Words fell from his mouth again.
“Vampires? Are you turning to horror writing now? Just don’t let Chloe read it, I don’t want her to have nightmares!” Michael glared at his wife’s back as she turned round to get even more condiments from the kitchen cupboards. How much could one man put on a few pancakes? But that was not important right now. Merrill was a vampire, and that answered so many questions. Like how she had kept him at arm’s length, trying to protect him from her world of darkness, how romantic. Perhaps that man that took her away was the vampire that, what was the correct term? ‘Made’ her into a vampire? He would certainly stand to reason as to why Merrill had left with him. But Merrill, vampire or not, loved Michael, she had proven that when she had pleaded for his life, and Michael still loved her. And he would become a vampire to be with her, and take her away from her, her ‘maker’? His mind tumbled through all the vampire legends he had encountered, trying to familiarise himself with the life he was about to lead. Being a vampire would mean he would have to drink human blood, it would mean he would have to kill. The thought of killing had never bothered him much, how close had he come to killing before? A rush of adrenaline came back to haunt him, tease him of all those moments when he had thoughts of killing others. Being a vampire would come easy to him.
“Michael, you’re not eating, what’s wrong with you? You haven’t said a word all morning? You had better snap out of it before Chloe comes down!” Michael looked up at his wife standing over him, hands on hips, an impatient look in her hazel eyes, her blonde hair tied messily in a ponytail, her apron covered in flour, and he hated her.
“What can’t you be more like Merrill?” Michael spoke to her venom in his voice. His wife stood momentarily puzzled by her husbands’ question.
“Merrill? Who the hell is Merrill?” She demanded. Michael slid of the bar stool and stood up, slowly moving towards his wife.
“She is the love of my life and I will not let you stop me from being happy anymore.”
“Oh my god! You’ve been having an affair?”
“Yes, and we want to be together forever.” His wife was looking at him like he was speaking a foreign language; she was obviously under the impression that he loved her, and not Merrill. But how could anyone love someone who was as irritating as her.
“No.” Her voice was edged with tears. “No, no you can’t do this.” Her mind slowly processing what was happening. “Why are you doing this? Haven’t I been a good wife?” Her questions were annoying him. He moved towards what was fast becoming a gibbering wreck before his eyes. Michael picked up the large kitchen knife before he even registered that he had seen it out of the corner of his eye. “What are you doing? Put the knife down Michael, you’re scaring me.” Michael smiled he couldn’t believe his wife was still talking.
“You’re a nagging, stupid dog and I hate you. You’ve stop me from being all I could be, but not anymore. I’m going to be powerful, and live forever.”
“Michael, what are you talking about? Are you crazy?” His wife began to see the insanity burning in her husbands’ eyes, and started to edge backwards, away from the knife in his hands.
“No, for the first time in my life, my mind is clear, and I know what I have to do in order to be happy. You see, I met a vampire, the most beautiful being on earth, and we will be together. I’m going to be a vampire.”
“You’re talking crazy.” She wife pleaded as she backed into the kitchen counter. “Please Michael, don’t do this.” But her words fell on deaf ears as Michael brought the knife down on her chest. Susan sank to the floor, her hand on her chest where she had been stabbed. She looked at her palm covered in blood. “Michael.” She whispered, but Michael merely answered by plunging the knife into his wife again and again in a frenzy, falling on his knees, enjoying the motion of every stab. But all too soon the pleasure was over; his wife was no longer struggling to move away from him, she just lay there, useless in death as she had been in life. He put the knife down on the floor, and slowly moved his hands over her body, his fingers found one of the wounds caused by the knife. Blood trickled from the cut; slowly he dug his fingers into the hole, feeling the squelch of blood oozing out. His lifted his hand to see his fingers covered in deep dark rich blood, his new food source, he moved his fingers to his mouth, and sucked at them. Not half bad, he thought, he could get to like this.
“Daddy!” The excited voice of a seven year old girl came from behind Michael; he turned to be faced with the child version of his wife. Chloe stood there in her pink pyjamas, teddy bear in hand, and a huge smile on her face. She moved forward to embrace her father, but stopped suddenly, with her expression turning from happiness to puzzlement at the scene before her.
“What’s wrong with mummy?” The child moved her gaze from the form of her mother on the floor to her father, her hazel eyes developing a fearful edge. She tucked the teddy bear under one arm, and started to play with her blonde hair. “Daddy, why is mummy on the floor?”
Michael looked at his daughter, and felt nothing, except maybe a slight disgust that his child could resemble his wife so much. He had no need for a child in his life with Merrill. He picked up the knife.
“Daddy?”
Marty woke up from a pleasant days sleep; he stretched out in his coffin, and rubbed his eyes. Memories of the night previous came flooding back, and he realised he was alone and that wasn’t right. Did he dream that Merrill was sleeping in his coffin with him? No he was pretty certain that had been real, as was everything else that night, he smiled. Merrill must have slipped awake before sunset, so as not to get caught being with him; a slight feeling of hurt crept over him, of rejection. Merrill still didn’t want to be associated with him in that way, she still wasn’t over Drew. His smile faded, and he threw back the lid of his coffin with his telekinesis, and sat up in a huff. He looked over at the other two coffins in the dorm, already open, indicating he was the last to get up.
“Who’d have thought Merrill would pull at a writer’s workshop?” Karl joked as he sat, leaning back in his chair, feet up on the table and sipping at his blood pack through a straw.
“Who’d have thought Merrill could pull?” Essie said a smirk on her face. Drew sat there silent, a dark expression on his face. The three vampires sat around the master table in the centre of the room, having breakfast.
“Murdoch’s not going to be happy if she wants to start dating a mortal.” Drew said rather sulkily.
“But it’s different with Merrill, she’s the most human of all of us, she’d be fine dating a human, I can’t see her losing it and feasting on him.” Karl mused.
“Then that’s double standards, why is it ok for Merrill but not for me?” Drew whined.
“What’s ok for Merrill?” Marty said wandering in, standing behind Karl.
“To date a human.” Karl said leaning back even further in his chair to look at an upside down Marty.
“What?” Marty stood amazed at what he was hearing, either he had dreamt everything that had happened in the last 24 hours or he had woken up into an alternative universe.
“Yeah, some guy drops round just after sunset with flowers for her.” Karl continued, sitting back upright in his chair. Alarm bells started ringing somewhere in the back of Marty’s mind, as he leaned on the back of Karl’s chair.
“Some guys really do know how to romance a girl.” Essie added, “Murdoch’s up with them now, I think he said his name was Mark or something.” Karl shook his head.
“No it wasn’t Mark, it was...”
“Michael.” Marty cut Karl off.
“Yeah, that was...” Karl turned round to see Marty fully vamped out, eyes blazing red, and fangs bared.
“Come on,” Marty was moved quickly to their cellar exit, he paused only to see the puzzled look on his fellow vampires faces, “They’re in danger.” It only took Marty a second if that to reach Murdoch’s office. No-one was there, until a mere second later he was joined by Drew, Essie and Karl.
“What’s going...” Marty cut Drew off with a single look, and all four listened hard to the voices that were coming from the Foyer just outside Murdoch’s office. Quietly they moved to the doorway, peeking out to see what was going on, yet despite seeing with their own eyes they did not believe what they saw.
Dr Murdoch knelt on the floor, his head bowed, not daring to move; desperately trying to think a way out of the situation. Murdoch thought he had every situation covered but this scenario was completely unexpected, for once he had no idea of what to do. Michael stood leaning over his prey, a revolver to the Dr’s head; yet his dead gaze was fixed upon another, Merrill, his Merrill, tears rolling down her face, hugging herself and shaking with fear.
“Come on my love, don’t listen to him, I will keep you safe forever if you let me; make me into a vampire and no-one has to die here.” Michael spoke gently, it was obvious Merrill wanted to make him into a vampire but she was so scared of this Murdoch guy, and no doubt her ‘maker’. He hadn’t expected to be confronted by a human in the process of this, at least he was pretty sure this Murdoch was human, but it had served his purpose, he now had leverage to use against Merrill’s maker. This human obviously protected them during the day, and therefore was valuable to them.
“Merrill, listen to me, don’t do it, this guy is insane, imagine what he would be like as a vampire.” Murdoch paused his speech as the barrel of the gun was jabbed into the back of his head.
“Shut-up!” Michael hissed, “Merrill, please come with me, we can have a wonderful life together, I can rescue you from this place.”
Merrill thought hard, it seemed like an impossible choice, if she didn’t turn Michael into a vampire he would shoot Murdoch, but if she did, the consequences would be devastating. A soul that empty, that insane, could easy become a powerful vampire, someone who would join the Fury, someone who would kill and live true to the vampire lore of old. Could Merrill create a killer in order to save her teacher? Which was the lesser evil? One mortal’s life to save countless others, or save one life at the expense of how many? Merrill could not stop the tears, she was frightened, frightened of the situation, frightened of the consequences of her choice, frightened that she would not be able to do what the experiment asked her to do. She heard Murdoch’s words, and yet she could not obey them. She had to save her teacher; Merrill allowed her fangs to grow.
“No, Merrill, don’t.” Marty whispered, willing her to stop.
“Why doesn’t she just attack him, the gun won’t hurt her, he obviously hasn’t read up on his vampire folklore.” Karl said in a hushed tone to Essie.
“She’s protecting Murdoch.” Essie answered
“And for those of you that haven’t been shot before, it bloody hurts!” Hissed Marty, “We need to get him to take the gun off Murdoch; then we can rush him.”
“How are we going to do that?” Drew said, “What’s the plan?”
“We give him another target.” Marty said, “Wait for my signal.” Before anyone could stop him, Marty had moved into the centre of the foyer.
“Well hey there Micky, isn’t this a nice reunion.” Marty said with full vigour as loud and obnoxiously as he could.
“Marty.” Merrill cried out Marty read the panic in Merrills’ eyes, and willed her to read his mind.
“Come on Merrill,” he said under his breath, “get with the plan.” Marty’s red gaze stayed on Merrill, watching every motion her face made, then suddenly he saw it, that little nod of recognition. “Hitting me with a car didn’t work so you trying bullets instead? Let me tell ya a little secret, that won’t either.” He watched Merrill grab Michael’s arm as if she was afraid. It worked; Michael moved his focus momentarily on to Merrill, and then back on to Marty. He was buying the fact that Merrill was afraid of Marty, and that Marty was a threat.
“It’s ok my love, I won’t let him take you again, you’re mine now.”
“Really,” said Marty taking a step forward, Michael instinctively moved the gun from Murdoch to point it at Marty. Marty smiled as he slowly raised his hands. “I don’t think you will take her, I won’t let you, she is under my control, my power.” Michael used his free hand to grab at Merrill, holding her firmly by the waist.
“Save me from him.” She whispered to Michael, she had to make him believe she wanted to go with him. Michael smiled, and lowered his gun; he tilted his head to one side, he was not afraid of this vampire, and he was going to prove it.
Casually he let go of Merrill and moved the gun into his left hand, stepping away from his beloved, he decide to call this Marty’s bluff, to see exactly how much he cared for Merrill. Slowly Michael raised the gun, and pointed it at Merrill. Marty’s eyes widen slightly, what was this crazy human doing? Was he testing Marty to see if he would let them go to save Merrills life? She wasn’t in danger of dying but Marty didn’t want Merrill to get shot either, and he doubted very much that Michael would shoot her, but he couldn’t risk it, he had to get Michael to be scared of him, so he would be his target should the gun go off. Marty scanned the room, and saw the light switch, using his telekinesis he began to turn the lights on and off. Michael merely rolled his eyes, at the parlour trick.
“Let her go!” Marty growled, sending a few vases flying across the room.
“If she’s so important to you, you’re gonna let us leave right now, and no-one has to die.” Michael bargained. Marty smiled at the thought of someone trying to kill a vampire with bullets, but knew he wouldn’t risk Merrill getting even the slightest bit hurt. Marty concentrated harder lifting Michael a few inches off the floor. That got his attention. Marty saw panic in the human’s eyes; he saw the gun barrel move away from Merrill.
“Now!” Marty yelled as he took a few paces towards the hovering Michael. Three shadows darted across the room. Michael felt a force push him into the wall behind, then all was dark; but not before he managed to lift the gun and squeeze the trigger.
Essie helped Murdoch to stand, his knees were still shaky but he was unharmed.
“Thank you Essie.” He said, Essie looked over Murdoch’s shoulder at Karl, letting an unconscious Michael drop to the floor, blood smeared on the wall, and now trickling from his head, where the impact had occurred, and past him to Drew holding a quivering Merrill.
“Hey it worked, good plan man.” Karl called to Marty. He looked over to where Marty had been standing but saw nothing. Karl dropped his gaze to the floor; Marty lay there flat on his back, not moving. “Oh ha ha, very funny Marty, now get up.” But Marty did not move, a puzzled looked crossed all the vampires faces.
“Marty come on, this isn’t funny.” Drew called over. But there was still no reply; no sudden movement of the dead body to try and surprise them; no sick joke.
“Why is there so much blood on the floor?” Karl asked quietly, gazing at the pool of blood forming around the body on the floor. Murdoch scrambled over to where the gun had been dropped and expertly opened the cartridge, and emptied the chambers of their rounds. There in his hands the light reflected off the bullets.
“Silver.” He whispered.
So I hope you enjoyed and Part 2 is almost finished and I will post it soon - promise
xx
