“Obviously, we knew that was a lie,” the blonde said. “But I thought that maybe-- I don’t know, I guess I thought that maybe I could reason with him. He was my boyfriend, after all.”
“I understand,” I told the girls. “It’s not like you would have made it very far even if you had managed to escape. But what happened to Jill?”
“Isaac came back just before she got the door open,” the pink-haired girl replied. “And then he… made an example of her.”
“I’ve never seen so much blood before,” Brianna said with a shudder.
“I’m sorry you had to see that,” I said. “But that means there were still two other students left besides just you two, right? So did Isaac kill them, too?”
“Not right away,” Neko said. “He just kept us in the classroom for a while, and sometimes he’d leave, but he always came back before any of us could figure out an escape plan.”
“And then he started to drink from us a little at a time,” Brianna said. “I’m… okay, so like, I’m not super proud of this, but I actually kind of liked it.”
“Liked what?” I asked.
“You know,” the blonde said, “like when Isaac drank from me, it felt-- I don’t know, it just felt good, you know? Like, I know he was a fucking psycho at the end, but whenever he drank from me, I just… I guess I just liked it. Is that weird?”
“That’s totally normal,” I told her. “My girlfriend and her roommates feel the same way whenever I drink from them, so you don’t have to be embarrassed by that.”
“Yeah, I felt the same way when Isaac drank from me, too,” Neko added. “It always pissed me off so much because I hated him, but it still felt good when he drank my blood.”
“Well, it’s not like he really considered your feelings about anything,” I said, “so it makes sense that you would have mixed emotions about it, even though you liked how it felt.”
“That’s fair,” Brianna agreed. “So anyway, Isaac fed from us just a little at a time, so he wouldn’t take too much and just kill us right away.”
“Well, he did kill Scott,” Neko pointed out. “But that was his first try, so I’m pretty sure that was actually an accident.”
“So how did you end up in the library?” I asked.
“I think that was a few days ago?” the blonde sighed. “Campus cops-- vamps, I guess-- started to search through all the buildings, so Isaac said that we needed to move.”
“That’s when we ended up here,” Neko said. “And that’s when Isaac met some other vamp that he… well, he gave Brad to this other vamp as kind of a… a truce, I guess.”
“I assume that Brad was the only other student left, besides you two?” I asked.
“Yeah,” Brianna said and bit her lip. “I don’t know if Isaac was afraid of this other vamp, or maybe he just thought he needed an ally, but he handed Brad over, and this other vamp-- well, I don’t think he’d had much practice drinking from humans without killing them.”
“I’m guessing that Isaac’s friend must have been the vamp that I met downstairs,” I said. “He’s dead, too, in case you were worried.”
“Good fucking riddance,” Neko growled.
“I’m sure Isaac wanted an ally,” I said. “He knew that I was coming, and he thought the girls were coming along with me. So he probably thought that if he had another vamp on his side, they could get rid of me and take all four girls for themselves, on top of the two of you.”
“That sounds about right,” the pink-haired girl muttered. “Fucking asshole.”
“Do you know anything else about what Isaac had planned for Nat and the others?” I asked. “I know this is all really fucked up, but I just have a hard time thinking about how he planned to lure his own sister and her roommates here.”
“Tell me about it,” Brianna said. “I kept trying to reason with him, but he-- well, let’s just say he, like, didn’t take it well.”
“He was just as much of an asshole about Nat as he was about everything else-- after he turned, I mean,” Neko said. “He told us whenever he texted her, and when he talked on the phone with her, he laughed about it as soon as he hung up.”
“He just kept saying that he couldn’t believe his luck, that you were going to just come up here and hand them all over to him,” Brianna said. “And I kept telling him that he was talking about his sister, but-- I guess that kind of thing didn’t really mean much to him anymore.”
“I’m sorry, Brianna,” I said. “I know he was your boyfriend, so I’m sure-- well, I’m sure it wasn’t easy to watch him change like that.”
“Ugh.” The blonde shuddered again. “The sooner that I can forget that creep was ever my boyfriend, the better.”
“Fair enough,” I laughed. “So did Isaac ever talk to you about what his plans were? Or did he have any plans, other than just to camp out here in the library?”
“Isaac was never really, uh, ambitious, I guess,” Brianna said. “Even when he was still a human. He kind of just expected things to fall into his lap, like how he thought that you would bring Natalie and the other girls to him.”
“I think he wanted to get off campus eventually,” Neko added, “but he never said where. He just said that he needed more blood bags before he moved us again.”
“But he never tried to find any other humans on campus?” I asked. “Wouldn’t that have been easier than to wait for me to bring along Nat and her roommates?”
“Yeah, but that would have required more effort,” the Japanese girl said. “And Isaac always liked to take the easy way out.”
“Well, he did try to look for humans a couple times,” Brianna said. “But I think he had a hard time finding any that were still alive. The campus cop vamps did a pretty good job clearing out all the remaining humans, so Isaac would have had to look pretty hard for anyone that they didn’t get.”
“Well, I don’t know what I’ll tell Natalie,” I sighed, “but thank you for telling me all this.”
“I’m sure she’ll understand,” the blonde murmured. “I know it probably won’t help to know that her brother turned into a monster, but I guess at least she’ll know that he wasn’t ever scared or terrified for his life, like he told her on the phone.”
“I don’t know if that’s better or worse,” I said, “but I appreciate that.”
“So, Sam…” Neko trailed off. “I’m really sorry that you have to try to figure out a way to explain all this to your girlfriend, but… well, what happens now?”
“You mean with you two?” I asked.
“Well… yeah,” the pink-haired girl said as she tugged on her ear.
“That depends on whatever you decide,” I said. “I’m going out west with Natalie and the other girls, or at least, that’s the plan. We’re gonna try to make it out to Colorado eventually, where one of the girls has a family ranch, but it’ll probably take a while. And before we can do anything else, we still have to get out of New York.”
“So does that mean you have… uhh… supplies and everything?” Brianna asked. “And like… food?”
“Yeah, we’ve got enough to last for a little bit,” I said.
“And food, right?” Brianna repeated. “You’ve got plenty of food?”
“We’ve really only eaten shit from vending machines for the past week,” Neko explained. “Isaac wasn’t exactly generous with our food supplies, so we’re--”
“So we’re starving!” the blonde sighed.
“Don’t worry, there’s plenty of food,” I said with a smile. “I always make sure Nat and the girls have a bunch to eat. Otherwise, they won’t be strong enough to keep giving me blood.”
“Oh, my god, that makes so much more sense than what Isaac did,” Brianna sighed.
“So basically, here’s what I’m saying,” I continued. “If you want to come along with us, you can, but I sure as hell won’t force you to. You’re just as welcome to stay here and try to make it all on your own.”
“Uh, no, thank you,” Neko said. “I saw e
nough on our way from the classroom to the library to know what happens to humans who try to make it on their own.”
“But if we come with you,” Brianna murmured, “does that mean we have to--”
“You don’t have to do anything that you don’t want to do,” I said quickly. “I take blood from Natalie and the other girls so I can stay strong and keep them safe, but I know how to do it without hurting them, and I would never take more than I had to.”
“I believe you,” Neko announced. “I’m in-- but I just have one question. How are you planning to get out of the city?”
“I have an armored truck I took from a bank,” I said with a shrug. “I took a boat to get up here, so we’d have to go back down the river, but then I plan for us to take the truck out of the city and then head west from there.”
“Sounds good to me,” the Japanese girl said. “If you’ll have me, I want to join you.”
“Good, we’ll be glad to have you,” I said. “What about you, Brianna?”
“Well… I mean, yeah,” the blonde said as she tucked her wavy hair behind her ears. “I want to get the hell out of New York as fast as possible, and you-- well, like, you did save us from Isaac, you know.”
“So, about that,” I sighed, “there’s just one rule that you should know about if you’re going to come with us.”
“And what’s that?” Neko narrowed her dark eyes.
“When I told you to stay put just before I fought Isaac, I fucking meant it,” I growled. “Isaac almost killed you because you got in the way, and if you had listened to me, that would never have happened.”
“I know,” Brianna said as her lower lip started to tremble. “I mean, I understand. I just-- well, we didn’t know you were a vamp, you know? So we just wanted to escape because…”
“Because we thought you were just a human, so there’d be no way that you could win against him,” Neko finished.
“But then you did!” the blonde said. “And you literally saved my life.”
“We’re sorry if we made your fight more difficult,” the pink-haired girl said. “We’ll know better for next time.”
“Good,” I said. “Because if I tell you to do something, you have to do it. It’s the only way I’ll be able to keep you safe, understand?”
“I understand,” Brianna said.
“Ditto,” Neko added.
“Okay, then,” I sighed. “Now that all that is out of the way, how about we get our asses back to my boat, and then we can start to get the fuck out of New York?”
“Yes, please,” the pink-haired girl said. “I’d be okay if I never saw this fucking city again.”
I stood up, helped both girls up to their feet, and felt a rush of blood to my head. I rested one hand against the wall for balance and wondered how long I could go without any more blood. I had used a hell of a lot of energy in my fight against Isaac, and I knew that I would need to drink pretty soon.
But I had only just managed to convince Neko and Brianna that I wouldn’t hurt them and that they could trust me, so I didn’t want to immediately follow that up with a ‘but I’m still gonna need to drink your blood.’ I wasn’t sure if I could make it all the way back across the river-- or even just back to the boat-- without more blood, but I wanted to try to go without for as long as possible.
Or at least as long as it was safe.
“Are you okay, Sam?” Brianna asked.
“Yeah, I’m good,” I said as the pounding feeling left my head. “I’m ready if you two are.”
After I opened the door for them, Neko started toward the staircase that held Isaac’s corpse, but I caught her arm and shook my head.
“Let’s take a different stairwell,” I said. “That one is, uh--”
“That’s where you killed Isaac, right?” Brianna started to tuck a wave of her blonde hair behind her ear before she saw that it was tinged with blood. “Ugh!”
When she started to wipe the blood on her hand off on her pants, I grabbed her wrist.
“Wipe it on the carpet, or wash it off,” I said. “Your scent is already strong enough to attract every goddamn vamp on campus, so you don’t need to literally coat yourself in your own blood, too.”
“Sorry,” Brianna said and then swallowed. “So I… you think I smell nice?”
“Oh, my god, Bree,” Neko groaned. “He means your human scent, not your fucking perfume.”
“Oh!” The blonde clapped her hand over her mouth. “My bad, sorry.”
“That’s okay,” I laughed. “You both smell nice, actually. And I don’t mean your perfume.”
“So what do we smell like?” Brianna’s blue eyes went wide. “Do we smell like candy to you or something?”
“Easy, tiger,” Neko said with a smirk. “Why don’t we get out of the library and then we can ask Sam here what we smell like, okay?”
“Alright, fine,” Brianna said. “I’ll try to stay focused.”
“She won’t,” the pink-haired girl told me. “I mean, she’ll try, but she definitely won’t.”
“Good to know,” I laughed. “Come on, let’s try the other stairwell. And remember-- if I tell you to move or to do something, you need to do it.”
“Got it,” Neko said, while her friend nodded quickly.
I led both girls toward one of the staircases at the front of the library. When we reached the stairwell entrance, I held up my hand so they would wait behind me, and then I took one cautious step forward with the Louisville slugger raised and ready for action.
There was nothing but silence in the stairwell, so I jerked my head for the girls to follow behind me, and then I started down the stairs. As much as I wanted to fly down the stairs, sprint across the campus, and run through Manhattan all the way back to the Summer Breeze, I knew that I had to be more careful now.
I had two human girls to protect, so that meant that every time we reached the landing halfway between floors, I stopped and listened for at least half a minute before I had us move forward again. I didn’t want to take any chances that we might run into more vamps in the library, so I needed to take every precaution.
After we passed the entrance to the fourth floor, I started to feel pretty good about our chances of getting out of the library without any problems. But only halfway down the next flight of stairs, I had to grip the railing when my head started to swim again.
“Shit,” I muttered.
I hadn’t lied when I’d said that both girls smelled good. Brianna smelled like the beach, but that wasn’t a surprise since she looked like a damn swimsuit model. Neko smelled like some kind of flower, but I couldn’t think of what. It was sweet, but not too sweet, so it was just enough to leave me wanting more.
And right now, I definitely wanted more.
I inhaled to try to steady my heart rate, but all I could think about was how hard my pulse pounded against my temples, and all I could smell was the girls’ sweet blood that throbbed in their every artery.
There was no way that I would make it all the way back to the boat without more blood, and definitely no way I could fight if we ran across trouble. I had wanted to try, but the fight with Isaac must have taken more out of me than I realized. I knew there was a chance that my eyes had already started to look a little bloodshot, so when I looked at the girls, they might get so scared that they would just run right the fuck back upstairs.
But if we wanted to survive, I would just have to convince either Neko or Brianna to give me some of their blood.
“Sam?” Neko murmured. “Do you hear something?”
“No.” I shook my head. “I need… fuck. Don’t freak out, okay?”
“Okay,” both girls whispered.
I turned toward them and blinked to try to focus my vision, but I could already feel how dry my eyes were, so I knew that I was pretty desperate for blood at this point.
“Oh!” Brianna gasped, but she didn’t run away.
“I thought I might be able to make it,” I said, “but I think I was wrong.”
“You need blood,” Neko said, as if I had just told her that I needed more laundry detergent.
“Yeah,” I sighed. “I’m afraid I do, and I’m afraid that I need it right now. I’m so sorry.”
“What happens if you don’t get it?” Brianna murmured.
“If enough time goes by, my body will start to break down, and I’ll lose my mind,” I said with a shrug. “We call those feral vamps.”
“Oh!” the blonde gasped again.
“Look, I know I said that I wouldn’t make you do anything that you don’t want to,” I said, “and I won’t, but I’ll just be honest with you--”
“If you don’t get blood, you won’t make it,” Neko said. “And neither will we.”
“Exactly,” I said.
“I’ll do it,” the pink-haired girl said without any hesitation.
“Are you sure?” I raised an eyebrow at how fast she had made up her mind.
“You said you know how to do it and not kill me, right?” she demanded. “And sooner or later, we’re gonna have to trust you. Might as well start now.”
“You don’t, uh, need blood from both of us, do you?” Brianna whispered.
“No, I should be okay with just Neko’s,” I said.
“Okay,” the blonde said. “It’s not that I don’t-- it’s just, Isaac, like, just died, and he--”
“It’s fine, Brianna,” I interrupted. “Really, don’t worry about it.”
“And you’re really okay with this?” Brianna asked her friend. “Because if you’re not--”
“Ah, come on, Bree,” the Japanese girl said with a smirk. “What’s the worst that can happen?”
“Um, you could, like, die!” the blonde hissed.
“We’re living through the apocalypse,” Neko said with a shrug. “That’s always a risk. If Sam doesn’t get us out of here, we’ll be dead in the next few hours, anyway.”
“Let’s get off the stairs first,” I said. “We can go into a room on the third floor, so we’ll be safe while I drink.”
“Do I have to, um, be present?” Brianna asked. “Or could I maybe go to the bathroom and clean up a little?”
“Let me see how far away the study rooms are from the bathrooms,” I told her.
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