Nightfall – Chapter 5.The vampire felt his hands trembling as he staggered to the lab. He had chosen to do it in the dead of the night, where no one would discover him. His head spinning, he fumbled with the medicine cupboard in the dark and successfully retrieved the heroin the medics had carefully hidden. He was aware that the medics chose to hide the heroin in the lab instead of the hospital.
After all, he knew the lab like the back of his hand.
Desperately searching for a syringe, he knocked over a few bottles. Screw those, he thought. The vampire filled the syringe with heroin and clumsily tunnelled the needle into his vein.
He eased as he felt his head getting lighter and his muscles relaxing. He could barely feel the pain from his carefully stitched up stomach wound, neither could he feel the sore spot where the needle had ruthlessly punctured. He enjoyed this feeling immensely, although he wasn’t sure why he needed it so much.
He promised himself he wouldn’t get hooked.
--
Evelyn spotted her teammate’s silhouette as she approached the balcony of Team 3’s room. Smiling, she took her water bottle and settled herself next to the vampire.
“Hey.”
“Hey. Couldn’t sleep either?” Larry smiled. He moved a little to allow Evelyn some space and gazed at the moon.
“What’s troubling you?” The human asked tentatively before taking a gulp from her bottle.
Her friend kept silent.
The woman grinned. “Is it over the new member? You don’t have to worry so much, you know.” Evelyn giggled. “I’m sure you’ll accept her in no time.”
“I’ve already accepted her.” His reply came swift, laced with a hint of impatience. “It’s just over... something personal.”
Evelyn laughed softly so as not to wake Carson from his slumber. He could get very cranky if he was rudely awoken. She didn’t notice her teammate staring at her as if in a trance.
“Is it girl trouble?”
Larry blushed instantly. He quickly averted his eyes to stare at his clawed fingers.
“Tell me. Maybe I can help you.” Evelyn grinned at her friend. “So, who is she?”
The man slowly rose his eyes to lock with hers. Evelyn waited patiently, still grinning; she had expected him to tell her immediately. It suddenly dawned on Evelyn why Larry was staring at her like that. Her grin faded slowly until it was gone and the two hunters were left staring at each other in complete silence.
She gulped before taking another swig from her bottle, stalling for time while she thought of a reply. Wracking her brain for what she actually wanted to say to break the awkward silence, she swallowed hard and muttered, “Gosh.” She mentally beat herself up for it.
“I know... I’m sorry. It’s just that—these things can’t be controlled, you know?” Larry laughed nervously before running a hand through his hair. “Do you want to sleep now?”
“No! I mean, yes. Yeah, I’m just going to go—sleep.”
The vampire watched the woman exit the balcony wordlessly. He turned to face the sky once more and buried his face in his hands.
“Damn it.”
--
The night saw a very angry medic clutching a letter in fury, her strong hold threatening to tear the paper with her fingernails alone. She blew her fringe off her forehead and forced herself to calm down.
Her teammate sat up in her bed, groggy from sleep. “Wuhn yo ‘seep yet?”
Su Hui slammed the paper on her desk and stood up from her chair hastily. She turned to Valerie and hissed, “My mother sent me a letter.” Balling her fists, she closed her eyes and shuddered in rage.
“Oh. What did she say?” The half-vampire was immediately awake. Valerie swung her legs over the side of her own bed and hushed her friend. “Xia Yu’s still sleeping.” She nodded absently to the bed across the room.
“She’s making things worse.” Su Hui snarled. “She’s trying to make me feel worthless again. It’s not like I don’t have a proper job, right? At least I’m helping people, unlike my sister, who just needs to suck up to the woman who calls herself my mother.” She spat, voice dripping with hate. Valerie noticed blood trickling from her clenched fists and noted that Su Hui had broken skin.
The human breathed out shakily and stomped over to the desk where the letter lay. She snatched the paper up and crumpled it up with her bleeding hand. Tossing it carelessly into the dustbin, she stalked towards the shared bathroom in Team 1’s room and washed her hands, ignoring the sting of her palms.
When she came out, Valerie immediately offered her a hug. “Thanks, but it still hurts.” She muttered bitterly before noticing something out the corner of her eye.
“Where’s Xia Yu?”
--
Joyce couldn’t believe her eyes.
She didn’t mean to stumble into the lab. All she wanted was to go to the bathroom.
She approached the shivering figure in the lab carefully, not knowing if it would suddenly lash out and attack her. Just to be safe, she forced yellow into her eyes and her canines lengthened. Joyce tentatively reached out a clawed hand and turned the figure’s head to face her. Her eyes widened.
“Xia Yu?”
The man whimpered and coughed violently. Joyce shuddered and attempted to help him up before noting the empty syringe beside his foot. Her eyes travelled to the open bottle of heroin on the table beside the medicine cabinet.
“Shit.”
The woman leapt to her feet and flew out of the room down the corridor, banging on every door in the way and screaming at the top of her lungs. She let her legs carry her until she reached the researchers’ room. Slamming on the door until a sleepy Chun Zi poked her head out from behind the door, she wheezed, “Xia Yu. Heroin. Lab.”
That was all the researcher needed to hear.
--
“What the hell were you thinking?” Chun Zi snapped angrily. Around her, See Min observed Xia Yu’s progress and Su Hui dabbed a warm wet towel on his forehead. Xia Yu coughed again before breaking out in cold sweat.
“I don’t know. I just needed it so bad.” He averted his eyes and focused on the ceiling.
“You know,” See Min cleared her throat. “Let’s just forget about the Zhuang Ying incident. This isn’t the time to be in the middle of a fight, not with one of our hunters in that state.” She nodded towards the still vampire on the bed.
Shu Xian looked at the floor before raising her eyes. “Yeah, I suppose.” She let a smile grace her features momentarily.
Carson scratched his head and sighed. “What do we do with him? He can’t fight in this state.” Evelyn nodded sadly before catching Larry’s eye and looking away hastily. Larry just stared sadly at the floor.
Chun Zi ignored the discussion around her and looked at Xia Yu. She felt a lump rising in her throat and did her best to control her emotions. Angrily brushing tears from her eyes, she stormed out of the room, leaving the hunters wondering what had happened to her.
--
The stoic woman stared blankly at her fellow researcher’s back, watching her sob her heart out. Checking her watch, she noted that Chun Zi had been crying for half an hour straight. She silently approached the sobbing human and gave her a hug.
“You know, crying for the whole night isn’t going to make things any better.”
Chun Zi sniffled. “I know. I usually don’t cry. But when I saw him lying there, I couldn’t--” She broke into another sob.
“This question is inevitable, but who are you going to send on the next mission?” Shu Xian sighed and pushed her hair from her face. “Team 2 or Team 3?”
Chun Zi paused. “Team 3.”
--
Carson was disturbed. Very disturbed.
He was disturbed as to why his usually noisy teammates weren’t speaking to each other.
No, scratch that, they weren’t even looking at each other.
He sighed and spun around, looking at Evelyn and Larry who were keeping a distance of at least five feet from each other. He lazily raised an eyebrow at Larry and approached him to whisper something in his ear. A look of shock flashed across Larry’s face before Carson stepped back and pointed a gun at his head. He pulled the trigger and watched his teammate fall to the ground.
Evelyn gasped audibly. Running to Carson, she grabbed his collar and hissed in his face, “What did you do that for?” She could feel tears welling up in her eyes and turned her face away so her teammate wouldn’t see them.
She suddenly noticed Larry wasn’t bleeding ash. “You’re not injured at all, are you?” She snapped and Carson was stricken for a moment before nudging Larry to stop the pretence.
“Damn the two of you!” The woman harshly let go of Carson and reached for her Desert Eagle, watching Larry get up hastily. “Start running, assholes, because I feel like target practice!”
--
“I have a bad feeling.”
“What?” Shu Hui stared at her teammate. She wiped her Glock absentmindedly as the door opened and Shi Chun sat down next to Team 2.
“What are you talking about?”
“Melissa’s got a bad feeling.” Joyce announced. “What is it about?”
The woman furrowed her brow. “I don’t know. I just feel like someone’s going to die, or leave us.”
Shi Chun nodded. “I got that feeling too.” She twirled her hair around her finger. “I wonder if anything’s going to happen to Team 3.”
“Just wondering, if we’re hunting pure vampires,” Joyce piped up. “Pure vampires only drink blood, right? Tainted vampires eat like normal humans?”
“You’re a tainted vampire yourself, you should know.” Shi Chun drawled before it dawned upon the four women.
“They’ll be fine. They’re best in stealth, right?” Shu Hui laughed nervously. “They won’t die. Nothing’s going to happen.” Even the most optimistic one among them was starting to doubt her words.
Melissa tried to ignore the rising dread in her throat as she watched the skies darken outside their window.
--
Carson moved swiftly in the shadows behind his teammates, glancing behind his shoulder every now and then to check for approaching vampires. He grimaced as he rubbed the back of his head where Evelyn had whacked him earlier. With her Desert Eagle, no less.
He blinked as his teammates both leapt out of the shadows and fired around them. The pure vampires scattered into ash and fell lightly around the duo, like snow.
He grinned. “You two have chemistry.”
“Don’t think too much. The vampires were approaching so we had to attack.” Evelyn said huffily. Larry looked a little hurt at her comment and merely scanned the surroundings for more vampires.
Carson joined them and grinned even wider. He had seen this coming for a while. It was pretty obvious Larry had a thing for Evelyn, however Evelyn did a pretty good job of hiding her feelings.
He slowly withdrew his Beretta 92 from its holster and filled the magazine. A cold breeze blew past them and he shuddered.
Evelyn gasped.
The tanned human felt a cold grip on his shoulders. It was icy-cold, and it reeked of trouble. He tried to force the hands off but they held him in a death-grip. Carson spat, “What do you want?” He flinched as he heard hissing from behind him and a sudden cold breeze on his neck. He realised in horror that the vampire behind him wanted blood.
Damn it! Think!Before he could ram his elbow in his captor’s stomach, the pure vampire hungrily clamped her mouth on his neck, fangs puncturing the skin and sucking greedily on the pulse. He felt his head getting lighter and his neck getting uncomfortably warm. Turning his eyes to his teammates, he mildly noticed that both of them were also held captive by his captor’s accomplices. Evelyn had her head forced back and her neck was exposed to the pure vampire behind her. She snarled viciously and kicked her captor’s shin angrily, causing the pure vampire to relinquish his hold on her. She proceeded to kick him in the gut and shoot him in cold blood.
Carson tried to wriggle himself free from his attacker’s grasp, but the blood loss was getting to him. Once the pure vampire had enough of feeding, she bit another wound in his neck, making his eyes glaze over and yellow creep into them. He felt an odd sensation in his mouth, like his canines were getting longer. Carson thought it was weird, since he wasn’t a vampire, but he couldn’t care about that right now.
His captor pushed him away and the turned human fell forward, knowing his hunter life would never return once he was bitten.
--End of Chapter 5--*runs for the hills*