Red Eyes

Chapter V

[TW: Graphic Violence, Killing. Read at your own risk.]

When she had always waited for the dark to strike, she had become accustomed to the night breeze and comforting silence. Almost always, there was a throbbing pain in her head, just behind her eyes. A crippling pain, adding to her rage. She moved a step forward, and a step, and a step. Slowly walking around the corner of a street, towards an alley. Her hands were wide open, her sharp nails ready to rip a poor girl's heart open.

Then a stinging sound of metal clanked through the walls of the street. It rang into the vampire's ears, annoying the shit out of her.

"Fucking hell," Lethia snarled. She saw a girl trembling on the ground and toppling over the trash. A garbage can rolling over to the vampire's feet.

"Plea, please." The girl's lips were shaking.

Ah. That smell of fear—that's right. Be afraid of me.

Lethia kicked the garbage can away from her, hitting the wall behind the girl. She walked forward and crouched. The vampire cupped her cheeks with one hand. Her nails were digging through the latter's skin.

She licked her fangs. Blood stains remained on her teeth.

The girl started squirming around, kicking her legs around. Lethia tightened her hold, causing a whimper of pain to echo through the alley.

"Anong—anong ginawa ko sayo." The girl cried.

But Lethia continued to stare at her with no expression. Coldly, she replied, "Wala."

Living for hundreds of years, she understood the smell of emotions lingering in the air. Fear, panic, anxiety, and desperation. It's like hope burning, vanishing into thin flames, and creating a gut-wrenching stench. Lethia once loved it with passion. When she was a raging teenage vampire, she was just a few decades old. Then grew tired of it, then suppressed by it, and then willingly left it behind.

But it never really faded.

She could kill her and break her bones right now. But Lethia wanted the screams. She wanted her victim to shout for help that wasn't coming.

The vampire never really understood the hunger. It came naturally to them, and she never questioned it. Her mother would slap her across the cheek and kick her in the stomach when she second-guessed her human feed anyway. Saying, "You're a vampire! Act like it."

So, her eyes were deep red, her fangs pointed sharply, and she lunged into the girl's neck with no hesitation. It was mother's lesson.

She wasn't bad; she had to do it.

Screams filled the dark alley. It was familiar music to her ears. Lethia gripped the girl's body, wanting more blood. She deepened her fangs inside. Blood was spilling everywhere.

Blood was on her knees, blood was on her hands, and blood was on her chin.

But when the screaming stopped and the girl's breath faltered, She could still hear her heart beating.

Well, her nails would have some use now. She easily thrust her hand through the girl's chest, grabbing the heart and pulling it out all in one motion. The body dropped from Lethia's grip as she stood up with a heart in her hand.

She held it tight.

She wasn't bad; she had to do it.

She held it tight until it burst, and the organ remnants flew onto her face. The vampire licked the remaining heart and gulped any ounce of blood in her hand. Slowly, taking her time, while staring at her nth feed of the night.

She was bad; she had to crack. Kieran would forgive me, right?

Her headache never left.

---

*NEWSFLASH: 21 people are missing with no prime suspect. Murder spree on Cornelia Street.*

Lethia sat on the sofa. The room was dark, and the only light was coming from the television in front of her. Blood bags were on the floor as she lazily watched the news.

"It's 25 now, but okay," she uttered.

The door then opened, revealing an old vampire friend, Dawn. "Ate Lethia, let's talk."

Lethia almost rolled her eyes. She didn't because she knew she needed it. A fucking pep talk.

Dawn closed the door behind her and stared at the older vampire. "Sabi ni Lilith, nakailang kuha ka na daw ng blood packs."

"Yeah, so?"

Her friend sighed. "Kelan ka pa bumalik sa human hunt?"

She shrugged her shoulders and didn't answer.

"Ate Lethia. 21 people and counting? Really? Kala ko ba 'leave our past behind.'? Para kay Kieran diba?"

Lethia's face crumpled at the mention of the name. "I really didn't want it to be messy."

"Kaya nga tayo nag tayo ng ganitong business para hindi na mag human hunting mga katulad natin."

"Crucify me then." Lethia couldn't help but answer with venom in her tongue. She just couldn't help it, to be true to her nature.

"Bakit mo ginawa yon?"

She cracked her knuckles as she let the question linger in the air.

Dawn sighed for another time: "Whatever the reason, I hope you'll stop ate Lethia. Kieran would be so disappointed. For sure."

"Get out," Lethia calmly said. But Dawn didn't budge.

"Ate Lethia-"

"Get out!" She threw an empty pack at the wall.

Dawn didn't need to be ordered three times; she left without making a sound, leaving Lethia alone.

She wasn't bad; had she not done it.