The Huntress: Becoming a Huntress

by Mihaela Gheorghe

  “And how do you propose to do that?”

  He moves. His gesture, too sudden, makes me jump on the chair. A single jump and I am ahead of him. But he remained motionless, quiet, not at all surprised. The entwines his hands under his chin, keeping studying me. I do not read more than curiosity in his eyes. It's really good this way. Anyway, I suspect that now I look more like an animal than as a woman. What's really a very good thing.

  “Indeed,” he says softly, “your instincts are far above ours. I understand now why some of us consider you a threat.”

  I get up from the crouching position of an instinctive defense that I rook. I approach him with reluctance, but confident. But I do not sit down on the chair again. A flash as a long forgotten memory appears in the mind: a chair, me being blocked by a man who appears to be the Director of a high school; the mental image is accompanied by nausea. Much of my memory was erased with my transformation. But not quite everything. I cast that memory. I don't know what it refers to, and nor do I care about.

  “So?” I ask him as reaffirming what I said earlier.

  Nikos captures my gaze before speaking, as to ensure me to perceive everything he says, with utmost seriousness.

  “I am one of the Hunters’ instructors. This means that I personally prepare and train hunters to make them deadly weapons in the fight against vampires, in order to be able to succeed where many others before us have failed: the extermination of the vampires on Earth's surface.”

  His words make me happy. As if a psychopath is listening to the speaking of another psychopath. I am listening to him, charmed.

  “I will personally train you. I shall prepare you. I will supervise you. I will make you the best fighter, slayer, huntress of the Order. I can do that. But for you, it will follow a series of events and experiences quite horrendous. You'll be faced with striking starving hunger, with unbearable pain. You'll find yourself quite often on the verge of death. Just as often, maybe you will want to give up. But you must know that once you are into this program, there's no turning back. I want you to understand that I do not exaggerate anything, and that I do not want to scare you. Do you think that you are able to get through all this?”

  I have only one reply to him.

  “When we start?”

  As they say, the rest is mere history. He was right in everything he said and it still wasn’t enough. The little that he had said before I actually start my training could not be compared hill of beans with the truths that I faced in the coming years. But no matter how great the pains were, I came to know a greater pain: the pain of losing my creators. For it is useless to say that it passed not a single day without thinking of them, a single day without missing them, a single day in which the suffering leave me alone. Maybe that's why, more the preparation was difficult, difficult to endure, unbearable, more atrocious pains, more by terrible torments, I was even more and more determined, my hatred and anger against the vampires’ race stronger and deeper. I don't know, I think it did a good thing to me all this anguish and torments I’ve been through the

  training period, because I think it fueled my paranoid hate against the vampires. And as well, I know that I would not choose any other way. I endured, achieved, and mastered the necessary training for this very moment. I know that now. But then...

  Then, after much time I spent learning techniques and combat tactics, adopting abstinence practices, acclimatizing to support pains, and to wield weapons, I have come to believe that I am outside what I feel to be inside: a deadly weapon, an indestructible entity, a veritable force of nature, the Ultimate Hunter.

  I am a shadow. You don't see me, you don’t feel me, but if I allow you to. If I’d enumerate all the ways in which I can kill, it would mean to keep that up indefinitely. My only weaknesses, if you can call it that way, is the fact that my sight is diminished on the sunlight, and I cannot control myself in the presence of a vampire. Just the smell of it is enough for me to be reduced only at the level of instinct, to no longer have any reason, to do instantly what I was coached to do: to kill.

  I make my daily training with Nikos. We practice the technique on the ground. The truth is that I don’t have to be trained yet. He has no longer what to teach me. I put him down. I am above him, my fingers embedded in his esophagus, almost cutting his breath. My long hair envelops both of us. A glimpse passes through his eyes, fugitive, fast. I immediately get up. My hair on his face has created a feeling of intimacy that I dislike. I'm almost embarrassed, a fact which is annoying me even more.

  “I think it would be better to cut my hair.” I say more for myself.

  “Please, don't!” he says very fast, and more firm that I expected.

  I look at him, amazed. He never, in so many years, made any personal remark. That's why I'm so surprised.

  “Please,” he says, then, softer, “don't you cut your hair!”

  I run my fingers through my hair, thoughtful.

  “You fix it, if you want,” he continues, “but please, please, do not cut it.”

  In his voice there is a strange note. I look at him, as puzzled as before. The imploring tempts in his eyes bothers me. I feel how my features are getting harsher. I’m pretty rigid when I answer to him.

  “Maybe I’ll just have to fix it then.”

  I lay a hand toward him, helping him to get up. He takes a stronger soaring than we both thought he will. We stumbled over easily to one another. That's not the problem. Even if we would have hit each other hard, it would not have been painful. Pain is not the problem. Not the closeness itself. My displeasure stems from the fact that I feel Nikos thrilling in another way than ever before. Don’t you think that I'm so stupid that, after so many years, I did not realize men’s thrills. And I have found that it no longer depends on the race: humans, vampires or hunters, they all have the same sexual appetites. Just that some are more exacerbated in their senses than the others. For people, they seem to enjoy it, but not as intense as other kinds. The vampires, from all that I know, their sexual instincts are extremely heavy, intense and deep, and most of the time, if not every time, their amorous parties ends with a feast in which they devour their victims. The hunters, I saw that their bodily desires come only and only after he or she falls deeply in love. I never thought about Nikos in this way. I've always regarded him as a mentor, as a master, as someone I can trust so. On the rare occasions, I've considered him as being someone merely close. But in any case, not as someone I could love. Although we have an unlimited existence before, never care for anyone ever does come into my

  calculations. I have seen what it means to love and lose what you love. I can’t burden my existence with such pain. That's why I feel in the thrill he manages to hide quite well, however, a wave of attraction that he has tried to control though.

  “I hope I haven't hurt you.”

  I smile to ward off the split second of tension. He gazes at me intensely for a fraction of a second, before answering me relaxed.

  “Not at all.”

  But the pause following his words insinuates otherwise, just that it does not refer to a physical pain. The truth is that I care enough about him for not enjoying his suffering, but at the same time, I'm pretty indifferent, so I shrug of indifference. Fortunately, the unpleasant moment passes quickly, and he then becomes the same Nikos as always. A comrade and a mentor.

  “Duh-if you're not the best here, in the entire training center!” he smiles with pride.

  I smile back, with satisfaction.

  “Even better than you?”

  His eyes slide toward me.

  “Perhaps. Is there any particular reason why you want to be better than me?”

  It still amazes me that sometimes he seems to forget that my perception is greater than theirs, that parts of my brain have a greater speed than theirs, that I process better and faster than them. I know why he asked me such a question. I have not forgotten that this breed of rather I belong as I don’t belong, wants to know if I will turn against it, given tha
t in my veins flows as well a vampire blood. I catch him by his forearm to make myself understood very well. Nikos stares at me, bewildered. He knows I never initiate any contact, with anybody.

  “Hear me out, Nikos, and keep in your mind that never ever, I will come against you. I'm a hunter. I'm not and I will not be one of their kind. They represent everything I hate more in this world. And I won't rest until I will see them all exterminated.”

  Perhaps my gesture, accompanied by my serious tone that I used, was enough for him to give a nod.

  “So, am I good enough to go on my first assignment?”

  His response comes without delay, without hesitation.

  “You are ready for a long time, Patricia.”

  I stare open-mouthed at him.

  “Then why didn’t you send me so far in a mission? Why I kept wasting time here, instead of doing what I want more: to kill some vampires?”

  His eyes avoided me. He whispers very softly, more for his own thoughts, but he forgets that my hearing is so sharp.

  “Because I wanted you here, around me…”

  I pretend that I haven't heard anything and I continue.

  “So when am I going to go on a mission?”I beat over the old ground.

  My skin almost itches of impatience. Impatience to kill a monster, the impatience of nurturing with his still pulsing in my hands and mouth, the impatience of beginning to exterminate the vampire race. I think this sick wish I have to exterminate this species has more relation to exterminate those who killed Kyrya and Dom. So that I would be sure that I didn't miss any.

  “Nikos?”

  How he shuts up, I had to ask him for the umpteenth time. He shook, as if he wakes up from a reverie, only by him known.

  “Tonight.” he replies softly. “Tonight you're leaving on a mission. You are made and coached to go alone, with no partner. As a rule, the hunters go on missions in pairs. But not you. You are built to be single.”

  His deep voice seems to refer to anything more than the fact that I am trained to fight alone, but also to the fact that I am made to spend the rest of existence as single. I'm not going to live forever. After I'll be carried the mission, I'll find a way to meet my creators, to be reunited with them, wherever they are.

  Until then, I agree to be as Nikos already said: single.

  The phosphorescent doors of the club open. Of course that everything is on sensors. Indoors, you almost can’t realize which human beings are, and which holograms. The atmosphere is on fire. I don't take too long to spot on vampires. Nor they take too much to see and realize what I am and why I am here for. They disappear. People don't realize what's real and what's not, precisely because of the holograms. But I know what's real. Because my mouth filled with venom, because my body is starting to burn me once with my pupils, and because my teeth begin to grow, as well as my claws. Their disgusting smell I indicates me they are in the toilet. They are only three. They align as in a battle. They think they have the advantage of being able to fight from above. But they don't know that part of my blood is part of them. They don't know that some of my skills are due to them. They don't know that I can fight as well as from above, as well as from the bottom. Their jumpings do not pick me up by surprise at all, as I surprise them with mine. Their snarling do nothing else than to fuel my uncontrollable fury. Did any of them or even all of them... Kill my parents? I scream with anger, craving to exterminate them, with the desire to enjoy ripping their hearts. Nobody can hear me apart from them, because the noisy music covers my sound. One of them attacked me by jumping. I leap more than he, over him, while I catch his head. When he lands, his head is still between my hands, and my claws like blades are embedded in it with a single gesture, pulling his head back, suddenly. With a dry sound, his neck is broken. He would be able to recover, however, if at the same time, through his back, my hand, with my claws would not pierce him as some knives indestructible.. His heart is now stuck in between my long claws. Through his body, you can see a large hole. Within seconds, his whole body turns to dust and ashes. His flesh, yet bloody and warm, still beating, triggers the madness of eating it, of killing some more. I bite its relish. The others two’s red eyes are frightened now. They don't know exactly what kind of creature I am. Nor does it interest me to let them know. Just as I have not the slightest intention to let them survive.

  “Who are you?”

  The disgusting voice of one of them makes my hair stand on end. I grin towards them, my huge canines shining fiercely in the obscure moonlight. The knives that are my nails are as bloody, looking as menacing.

  “Your biggest nightmare.” I answer me. “Your end, the Ultimate Huntress.”

  He hits me in the chest, strongly. Feel his strength, but not enough. However, I lose a little my balance, and they both take advantage of this to attack me at once. I well sunk my feet into the floor. My hands are pounding them both in the neck. Although they jumped with their sharp teeth into my throat, my blows not only stop their attack, but force them to stop, chocked. They pant, but they are smart enough to retire rapidly. Then, there are some series of blows, so fast, that you can’t see. Here, one of us appeared, here disappeared. I can hear their snarls very clearly, but I hear as well their painful groans. A foot of mine hits the knee of one of them. I hear a crackle, accompanied by a groan. I know that I've broken his leg. But just as well I know that if I’ll give him time, he will regenerate. The punch I apply to the remained standing vampire, in his plexus, throws him in the large, bright mirrors. Until he throws himself over me again, my claws sunk already in the chest of the vampire whose leg I broke, grabbing his heart. I turn to the last vampire. He remained alone and I can see in his eyes that he’s scared. He knows that he can’t win this. He knows that this is the end of his existence.

  “Please,” he begs me, “have mercy!”

  How many people didn’t beg for his mercy? And how much mercy did he show? Who has shown mercy toward Dom? Who has shown mercy toward Kyrya? When I approach him, he makes no move to resist any longer. He his in his knees. You can't imagine a greater satisfaction than the one I feel now, when I see him on his knees at my feet, begging for mercy. Pity that I do not have. I sunk my claws through his temples and I roll them over, stuck in his head, in one motion, just as suddenly as I moved so far. I already ate a heart. I find it sufficiently. My hunger is appeased for now. No my thirst to exterminate these creatures. Not my hatred against them. I’ll take this heart to Nikos. Together, with the head of this vampire. I twist even more his head, pulling it upwards. Then, I jerk it at once. I remain with his head in my hands. He didn’t close his eyes. The rest of his body falls slowly to the floor. Then it turns, as the other two, in ashes. I take the heart in one hand, and the head in the other. I can’t go back, passing the Club, of course. I open one of the toilet’s windows, and I look down. The distance is quite large, about 20 yards away. I make a jump. I lose myself in the blackness of the night, carrying with me the trophies.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  I would not be able to say exactly how many years have passed. Nor how many monsters have I killed. Any how much vampire flesh I’ve fed myself with. Many, too many monsters I’ve butchered. Without any remorse. But, if you think that I got tired doing the same thing over and over again, or that I got bored, you would be fooling yourself. My power didn’t decrease,, as it has not decreased in intensity my hate. You know all about that ‘Appetite comes by eating’, or ‘Much will just have more’? So it was with me. More vampires I killed, more I wanted to kill. And more. And more, hopefully that among those I killed there was one at least of the murders of my creators. But as I couldn't be sure of this, I could not stop my fight until I will be exterminated them all, until all this cursed race will not be entirely dead. I am like to be out of control. Because a few times, Nikos wanted to give my assignments to other hunters. My anger was so great that he had to abandon his original plans to give me more and more missions.

  My instincts are the sharpest. My actions, my movem
ents, my fighting style, are perfect. I do not know fear. I don't know restraint. And especially, I do not know pity. I no longer know anything besides my obsession: to kill as many vampires as I can.

  Now I know that, although I still had human blood in me, I already gave up to one thing: to humanity itself.

  But back then, I didn't care. Back then, I wasn’t interested in that.

  Back then I was preparing for a new murderous mission. I must tell you that I became quite famous between the vampires, and I was just as haunted by them, as I was looking for them myself.

  “I am glad that I have not killed you from the beginning.” This man speaks to me, the man which is the oldest of us all.

  He is the High Priest of the Hunters’ Order, the highest in his rank. You have to know that everyone blindly obeys him, and that no one comments on any order that he could give. Demetrios, the High Priest, has the same dark skin, and dark eyes, but, unlike the rest of us, his hair is completely white. That doesn't mean that he’s less vigorous, or some sort of a decrepit, as you might think.

  I bow slightly before him, as to thank for a compliment.

  “You are now our Supreme Hunter. It's a great honor for you.”

  I don’t think that I ever to be spoken up. Even though I no longer have a full memory, especially of my time spent as a human, I am convinced that it is something that I have never accepted. But I don't allow myself to have feelings anymore. So I bow again, without any reply from my part. Anyway, I know very sure that Demetrios has not ceased to oversee me, did not cease to watch me, as to predict when I will turn against them.

  I'm kind of outsider among all these hunters. I am accepted, even respected, because they know that I am the most trained of all, the most powerful of all, with the most skills. You too may see me as an oddity, given the strange mixture of blood that runs through my veins. But they do not consider me as one of their own, especially since I'm leaving on missions all by my own. They tend to avoid me. I don't mind this at all. More I am left alone, better I relate to you. So now, at this meeting, which is annoying me, just as I was frustrated with those before, and I know I will resent those who will come in the future