The Vampire Dairies

Senator Olivera didn't try to hide her lack of patience. "You do not seem to understand, Patrick, your sympathy for these creatures is misplaced. They are bred for this one purpose. They do not know anything else."

Patrick tried hard to keep his voice from rising in pitch. He already knew he had next to no chance of winning this eons-old argument, and he didn't want to undermine his position even further by sounding like he was whining. "With the utmost respect, Madam Senator, the fact that they are bred for the purpose doesn't make it any better, in fact it makes it worse. You are effectively saying that it's acceptable for the creatures to know only suffering."

"They do not only suffer."

"In which part of their existence do they not suffer?  Perhaps you're referring to the few hours of the night when the pumps are disengaged and the creatures are given temporary respite from being slowly drained of their fluid, but are still restricted in their cages, unable even to turn around?  Or perhaps you mean the morning feeds, when the pipes lodged deep into their windpipes flood their stomachs with a colourless paste that meets the bare minimum of their nutritional needs?"

"You are being far too emotive. We are talking about animals, Patrick."

"Are we not animals?"

The senator's nostrils flared in disgust. "We most certainly are not. We may share the physical form with the species but that is where the similarities end. She stood and picked up her coat from the back of her chair. "This meeting is over. As you well know, the intensive farms are necessary to feed the population. If they trouble you then please feel free to patronise one of the many free-range farms that seem to be springing up everywhere nowadays." She walked to the door.

"Madam Senator, the name 'free-range' is incredibly deceiving. For the farms to meet the certification standard their livestock only need to be given a few hours out of their cages each day before they are violently forced back inside again." Patrick could feel his voice rising again but couldn't do much to stop it. "And there's also the issue of how long they live. Even on the so-called free-range farms, when the creatures' yield is past its prime they are culled and carted off to landfill. Would it be so much to ask that they could be freed and allowed to see out their lives naturally after all they have given us?"

Senator Olivera looked appalled. "Oh Patrick, now you are just being ridiculous." She raised her hand, palm out, cutting off any further conversation. "I'm sorry, I know you worked hard to put this material together. You presented it well, but what you are asking is simply not viable. Human welfare is not on anybody's list of priorities at the moment. There is the small matter of the economy to attend to. I wish you well in the future but our business here is over."

Patrick said nothing as the senator left the room. He had expected this reaction but he had known that he had to try just one more time. Now he was sure. Now he knew exactly what he had to do.

Patrick was a young vampire. He had started his new life just before the Creation Law was implemented. The humans had seemed happy to live cheek by jowl, crammed tightly into their limited land masses. This level of crowding was not acceptable to Patrick's kind, at least not to those in charge. Soon after taking control they had addressed the problem at source, by making it illegal to turn humans and create new vampires. It had not been popular in all quarters, not least because while there were draconian penalties for any average, everynight vampire caught breaking the new law, it was an open secret that if somebody with wealth and status was caught doing the same, they could easily buy their way out of the sun-pits.

Patrick's relatively short-lived time as a vampire gave him a different perspective than most, whose views towards humanity had had centuries, even millennia to form and to calcify. It also made him, if not a target for ridicule, then at least somebody with a reputation for naïve, liberal thinking. Patrick had rarely won a political or sociological debate, and he knew that his brief discussion with Senator Olivera had been his last attempt to do so.