Caius shakes his head - Cletus steps hesitantly inside, careful to leave the door wide open behind him. A warm summer breeze follows him in, brushing gently at his heels, rustling the cobwebs spun between the furniture and throwing dust up into Caius’s face. He squeezes his eyes shut and coughs, waving it away. 

Outside of his coughing, he hears another noise - a loud clattering sound. He looks around again, and instead of seeing Cletus, he only sees his friend’s smartphone, lying in the doorway where he had been standing just a moment ago.

Caius looks around. Immediately, worry seizes him - he rushes outside, the soles of his shoes echoing hollowly against the rotting floorboards of the heavy, stagnant old house, until he bursts out of the doorway and into the warm outside air.

Cletus is lying on the ground on his back. Caius immediately recognizes his friend’s clothing. There’s another man crouching over his supine form - a pale and slender man, wrapped in a cloak that’s blacker than the shadows of the forest behind him. A shock of long, straight red hair is tied delicately at the nape of his neck and trails like ribbons down his back.

The last glimmers of the orange sun glance off his red hair, making it glow like fire, then sink below the treetops. The air is thick with the feeling that comes only at dusk. It makes it hard to breathe.

The metal point of a syringe glints in the stranger’s hand - he’s carefully injecting something into Cletus’s neck. Caius starts to run towards him, but the man whips around at the sound of his footsteps.

His face is finely cut like a precious gem - his eyes glow red, and Caius’s blood roars in his ears. He suddenly finds he can’t move. His heart pounds at the same time as his nerves turn to ice, sending an agonizing chill rippling through his body. His lungs freeze - he chokes on air.

Pure, unadulterated fear paralyzes him. He can’t look away from the deep red glow of the man’s eyes.

Clete makes a tiny noise from the ground - Caius feels terror well up in his stomach, not fear of the mysterious man but fear that his friend is in danger - and he takes a gasping breath, going dizzy with the lack of oxygen. He forces his words out with force, like a hacking cough, spitting them with all his might through the paralyzing fright that squeezes him in its icy grip.

“What are you doing with him!?” He shouts. The noise grates on his vocal chords. He feels his throat going sore.

The man smiles at him. His teeth are bone-white and Caius sees the hint of a sharp incisor flash in the hazy twilight air.

“I have need of your friend.” The man says in a surprisingly affable tone. Calm and measured, with a hint of amusement. That smile quirks his ashen lips.

Caius forces himself to move. Any kind of movement - the fear and adrenaline battle inside his body, his heart racing while standing still. His finger twitches. The man raises his eyebrows.

“You’re very impressive.” He says, baring his teeth in a full smile, turning a little more to observe Caius. “Most humans wouldn’t be able to fight their instinct.”

“Instinct?” Caius hisses, grating the words out. He finally pulls his foot off the ground - he takes a half-step with great burden, the movement no more than dragging his leg forward and dropping his weight on the ground again.

“Prey instinct.” The man says, pulling the syringe out of Cletus’s neck without looking away from Caius. He tucks it away in his pocket. “What other instinct would an animal feel when faced with one of their species’ natural predators? Not many humans can shake off a vampire’s paralytic gaze.”

Caius hears a torn laugh - he realizes it’s his mouth that’s made the noise.

“Vampires?” He says, pulling from his well of willpower and raising his other leg, feeling like he’s walking through molasses, dragging his foot through the air. The tendons in his neck strain with the effort. His vision starts to go hazy, both with the exertion and the blurry veil of dusk falling, obscuring values and contrast from his eyes.

His gaze lands on Cletus, still laying on the floor. He sees his friend’s eyes are still open. Clete is still conscious. Clete’s pupils, wide with fear, fix onto him. His desperation to live is so thick that Caius can almost taste it on his tongue, wild and agonizing - he forces his feet forward again.