As the night began to draw to close and dawn began its creep forward, the two slipped out of the bar, last call having passed. The lights to the bar flickered out and the gravel lot held an eerie calm. Even lost in thought Mel stopped and took in her surroundings. Something was wrong. She could hear Thalia behind her, but that wasn’t the only heartbeat she could hear. Her bike wasn’t there anymore, she realized as the last of the lot's lights clicked off leaving only a single street light on by the road. 

“Mel?” 

“Quiet!” Melody hissed. 

They were well hidden, but she could smell them. Two distinct scents, human, still lingered. She could almost feel the eyes on her, but she couldn’t tell where. She stepped forward into the lot, where her bike once sat. 

“I know you’re there. I want my motorcycle.” She said, quietly into the dark. 

A crunch of gravel to her right, into the deep shadows of the vestigial silos of the place. She shifted ever so slightly in that direction.

“Hold it, corpse. If you move I might not hit so clean and it will be a long death.” 

“Mel?” Thalia asked quietly, before she was cut off with a sharp scream.

Mel spun, catching movement just as a second one grabbed Thal, dragging her into the dark. She moved before she thought. Gunfire cracked behind her, but she was already gone.  Time felt frozen in that moment, she was about to lose sight of them as they rounded the corner. 

Faster, Mel, fucking move it!

She was surprised at the speed she managed. In a blur of motion she zipped forward past the threat, wrenching him by the throat off of Thalia. That haze, the red flare of instinct didn’t just surface, it blinded her like the sun as she slammed him against the old brick of the building. Deep cracks and a shallow indentation cracked as the wall buckled slightly. She heard the crack of the man’s spine and wasted no time squeezing the man’s throat until – snap. With a snarl she flung the carcass into the lot. 

She scurried up the wall and surveyed from the roof. It didn’t take long to spot the other. He hadn’t moved from where she had heard the gunfire. She zipped forward once again, in that impossible speed and stood before him, head tilted. Studying. Watching. 

“Oh. Oh god, you aren’t just some drifter or…” 

“I am beginning to wonder if I should keep trying. Everyone keeps acting like I’ve suddenly become this awful thing.” Melody hissed, “Insults, threats, confrontations, attacks.” 

Mel took a deep breath savoring the scent of blood in the air. It called to her. She was hungry. She was doing her best, wanting to find a balance between taking life and not harming others. But it was their fault she was like this. People killed her, not another vampire. Not whatever the fuck Cade was. 

“It was your kind that killed me. It was Keegan and Callahan.” Melody grinned as the man’s face paled, “In moments like these I am beginning to wonder why I am trying so hard to pretend I haven’t changed. 

Mels fingers twitched, her fangs itched and her throat was so, so dry. Her vision narrowed and all she could see was the man and his fear. All she could smell was his blood and all she could hear was the beating of his heart. For the first time, she felt the rational mind, behind the haze, accept that she was going to kill. No bargaining, no justifying, no guilt. She tried. This was her first real night of normal. He ruined it. If they wouldn’t let her pretend, she wouldn’t. Not tonight. 

It is just pretending, isn’t it. 

Mel didn’t fight the thought, nor the weight dropping in her chest. She also didn’t hesitate.

In a blur she had slammed her knee into his gut, doubling him over before hooking his foot and toppling him to the ground. She hunched over him, fangs digging into his throat, she drank her fill. The first pulse of blood, the first taste was electric and hot. Nothing else mattered then, just the rush of life filling her, flooding her veins like a writhing live wire. She consumed every drop relishing in the hum under her skin. As she slowly rose she turned back to see Thalia standing stock still, hand over her mouth and eyes wide, half step forward. Mel paused, flicking her eyes to Cade, who stood behind Thalia rubbing the bridge of his nose. 

“I didn’t start this,” She growled, “But let me guess, I’m going to take the fault anyway, aren’t I?” 

“Perhaps not, but you sure as hell finished it all over my goddamn parking lot.” Cade grumbled. 

--

Thalia watched in a kind of horrified fascination. She had seen death, in a sense. She had attended a funeral, and seen the corpse of her uncle who passed. She found it so strange to think of that now, as she watched her friend rip into the throat of a man who moments ago threatened them. She remembered how so many said he looked at peace. She didn’t agree. Corpses don’t look at peace, they look inert. 

She took a step forward. She couldn’t look away, she didn’t dare look away. Vampires were supposed to be dead, reanimated spirits that hungered for blood of the living, and… she supposed they were like that in a way. Yet as Mel turned to face them with blood stained lips, she found she once again disagreed. Corpses looked inert, lifeless but Mel – She was full of life.

She should be appalled or terrified or… something. All she felt though was fascination. Mel avoided that fate, the inevitability of inertness, and a whisper of fear and wonder curled in her chest. At what it would be like, to harness that ability. All that possibility, and discovery, the things she could learn, but at the cost of others. It was selfish, but wasn’t that at the heart of all living things?

In this moment she was selfish for two things. She wanted Mel and she admitted she wanted to be like her. The thought was terrifying, the want to die to be more alive than she ever could in any other way. The way she wanted to teeter on the edge of life and death with Mel’s teeth in her throat. She shoved the thoughts down quickly.

* * *

Beth watched from her car across the street. She had hoped she would see Mel here but this… this was better than she had dared hope. She had watched as Mel and whoever she was with arrived and kept her window cracked for the slight breeze. She was so very lucky she had heard those two. They had a truck in the same parking lot as her, and they were not quiet. It seemed they were trying to track Mel too, though not by name. They had heard, or say they were saying, that something was leaving a bit of a trail, a drifter or newly risen. They talked about Liam and the other two that Mel killed in front of her very eyes. 

So, she nudged them in the right direction. She approached them. It was easy to prove, she was Liam’s girlfriend after all. She let them know she had been obsessed, she had seen what she was capable of and… They bought it. They thought Beth was clueless, recklessly trying to understand what she saw and managed to sleuth the identity out. They seemed impressed but really, she just wanted to see Mel work again. She needed to see her dragon breathe her fire.

She showed them her picture, she confirmed it was her and that she was in that bar, so they waited but not before promises that they would help her, train her to fight against things like Mel if she wanted. Promises she knew they wouldn’t and didn’t keep.