13 Floors in Every Direction

Chapter 21

Location: Sadie's apartment in downtown New York City

"Matyo? Matyo? Oh good, he's starting to come to." Matyo shot up smacking heads with Lance.

"Hey, Lance can I talk to you for a second?" Sadie asks poking her head in the room.

"Yeah sure." He gets up, leaving Jade with Matyo. "What's wrong with him?"

"With who Jade or Matyo?" Sadie asks leaving against the wall.

"Well, both," Lance says not knowing they were there to talk about Jade.

"There is nothing wrong with Matyo, he is simply reacting like anyone of his kind would under the conditions he's in."

"But what about the passing out and the seizure?" Lance ant buying the fact that there was nothing wrong with Matyo.

"Lance, Matyo's a vampire but not one like Jade. Jade is a very old vampire one of the first offspring that are known and have records. So let's say Jade is a 2. He's the second generation of vampire. As soon as Jade turns a human they become a 3 but if whoever turned Jade turns someone else they would be a 2. Understand?" Lance nods.

"And just like humans vampires evolve over time but Jade will never evolve nor will any of his direct offspring. The evolution only comes from the generation before Matyo. Which is why he has all of these crazy cool abilities. So if Jade is a 2 that would make Matyo probably somewhere around 237 in this situation." Lance just stared at her with his mouth open. He couldn't comprehend how much of a gap there was between Jade and Matyo.

"Lance don't think of it as a family tree where someone had 236 kids then Matyo. Think of it more as how the generations work in society it doesn't matter how many kids the Baby Boomers have because Generation X will be different, they would have evolved."

"Hey, Sadie he's starting to wake up." One of the werewolves says from a door down the hall.

"Ok, I will be there in just a minute," Sadie says and the werewolf closes the door again.

"Ok, so what's wrong with Jade then?" Lance asks finally accepting the fact that Matyo was fine.

"Since I met him, he carries more anger and pain than a thousand armies could ever bear. He was betrayed, deceived, and hurt. Believe me when I say he has already crossed hell. And the only time I saw peace in his eyes was when he saw you. Lance, you are the only reason he is still alive. Lance, you are the only thing that keeps him from going insane, the only thing that keeps him from killing himself. Jade is almost 350 years old, in the vampire world that's like a sweet 16, there's a celebration and everyone gets together and they have all these weird traditions. Lance you can't let Jade go to that."

"Why not if it's tradition then he has to go."

"No tradition is just peer pressure from dead people. Lance the vampire community doesn't want Jade around unless he pitches for their team. Jade has been so badly hurt by them in the past he would rather die than do their bidding again. Lance if he goes and refuses to join the clan again they are going to kill Jade. You can't let him go. Out here where there are people around no vampire is going to try and take on Jade by themselves they don't stand a chance. He might be old but he sure as hell is one of if not the strongest vampire in New York, maybe ever the country. And now that Matyo is with him nobody stands a chance." Sadie's warning left Lance with a ball in this thought.
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Walking back to the apartment Lance didn't say anything about what Sadie had told him. He couldn't risk an outburst, not here.

Jade and Matyo were having fun and not paying attention when Lance unlocked the front door and almost lost his shit. Everything was completely trashed. By this time Jade and Matyo noticed and Jade made a b-line straight upstairs with Lance and Matyo close on his heels. Jade sped up and went straight for their bedroom. When Lance and Matyo got there a man was laying on his back on the floor with a small pool of blood quickly forming around his neck head area. Lance was shocked the two weren't more than 2 paces behind Jade had did he manage to do that so fast.

"Jade?!" Lance said shocked.

Jade turned around looking slightly shocked himself his mouth and chest were already covered in blood. "Well... murder wasn't on the agenda for today," Jade said trying to look for the positive hoping Lance would explode.

"It's not on anyone's!!!" Lance yelled at Jade who just kind of stood the looking slightly embarrassed.

"Actually it was on mine, but not 'til next Thursday." This did nothing to help Jade's case. Lance just stood there in the doorway with Matyo before throwing his arms in the air and leaving.

"I expect you to clean that up, Jade." He said walking back downstairs.

"Ok Matyo lesson one: disposing of a body."