Poison

One - A Lack of Heart

- VERONICA -

There's a vampire in my attic. A lone male, pumped full of Wolfsbane and bleeding from a gash that runs from his right shoulder to just above his waist. On his thighs are several bullet holes that won't heal, not unless I give him something.

I'm not going to give him something.

There's an odd sense of satisfaction to that thought, to knowing that for once it's my mercy to give or not give, my choice to kill or not kill, my turn to make them beg or make it quick. The world is a place for those with a lack of heart. It's one big prison with no way out, and you can be the one holding the club or the one beaten by it. The truth is, I've been beaten enough times to know the latter is no longer an option. Now it's my turn to be the one doing the beating, and I intend to go at it with everything I have. It's hurt or be hurt, kill or be killed. Deny it, and the whole world will crush you like a cockroach under their boots and never look back. That's how it works.

At least that's how I thought it did until I'm the one standing on the other side of the bars. If you think being the one holding the baton will solve all your problems, well, then let me tell you this much: it's still one big fucking prison with no way out. There's still no escape from pain, no healing for old scars. You can beat your enemy until your sweat runs dry, but you can't beat the past out of you. Believe me, I've tried.

Which is why I'm standing in front of the door, experiencing a small panic attack that paralyzes every nerve in my body as soon as I smell the blood coming through the gap from the other side. I hate that our blood smells the same, how, every time, it brings back memories of the massacre in that attic. The images of that night still thrive in my head like a bad song from childhood being stuck on repeat. I can still see everything just by standing in front of that door. The shape of my mother's arms curling around my brother's body. The awkward angle of my father's broken neck as he lay dying. Everything, down to the shape their pool of blood had made before those vampires stepped on it. They hid me in the wooden crate by the window because I was the only one small enough to fit. That was all there was to it, how I survived. I used to hate how small I was as a child. Now I hate it even more.

I close my eyes and swallow the bile in my throat, along with my dinner that is threatening to come back up. Four years of moving back into this house, of setting traps and hunting down vampires and I can still puke my guts like it was yesterday when my family had been killed in that attic over a single thought. Then again, I've chosen to come back and use this room for a reason. I'm here because it brings back every pain, every memory of what I've lost, of what they've taken from me. They're the steel of my blade, the nerves that make me pull the trigger, the adrenaline that helps me make decisions normal people - good people - can't make and still be able to live with themselves.

I draw the one breath I need and punch in the codes, waiting for the mechanical lock to turn before pushing the door open. The now windowless room is flooded with light from the fifteen white UV lamps I've installed in it, and it takes me a few seconds for my eyes to adjust to the brightness. It's how I keep my vampires weak and defenseless in the middle of the night when they're most dangerous. Despite the more common knowledge about vampires, they don't actually die or burn in the sun like books and movies make you believe. That would have made my life so much easier if it did. The fact is, they just don't like being in the sun because they're weakened by it and they can't see. Think of them as nocturnal animals that are so well equipped to hunt in the dark that they can't function during the day. At night though, they're as hard to catch as trying to shoot down a bat in flight, and also impossible to do so without bait. It's why I had to go clean up the blood from my body before I come back here. The smell of our blood drives them crazy to the point of being rabid at times, and I need their brains to function for what I intend to do. At least long enough to get what I want.