Blood & Bruises

What Are You?

>>Seth

As I pushed open the door to the medical room, the first thing I heard was the metallic clatter of the knob rolling across the floor. I didn't pay much attention to it, though. My eyes were already searching the room, drawn by a strange, tense feeling that gripped my chest. And that's when I saw her.

Doc

She was sitting on top of another man. The sight stopped me cold, and a spike of anger flared in my chest.

What the hell was she doing?

My mind struggled to catch up, to make sense of what I was seeing. She was straddling the unconscious boxer's waist, her hands pressed against his chest, her face close—too close—to his neck.

"Huh?"

My first instinct was to yank her off him, to get her away from him, but something held me back. It was the way she was sitting there.... It looked almost predatory. A strange, primal fury twisted inside me, but as I looked closer, something else caught my eye.

There was blood on her lips, "Doc?"

My breath caught in my throat. It wasn't just a small stain; it was fresh, dark, and vivid, trickling down the corner of her mouth, slowly snaking its way down her neck.

I felt weird looking at her.... Why? Because she looked almost...sated.

Like someone who'd just finished a meal and was savoring the aftertaste. Her lips were parted slightly, "What-" And that's when I saw them—her fangs, sharp and glistening with blood, "What are you doing?"

The room seemed to tilt around me. I tried to blink away the shock, but it only sharpened after what I saw.

"What the hell..." I muttered under my breath, but the words came out strangled. My heart was pounding in my chest, and a cold chill crept up my spine. A hundred thoughts raced through my head, none of them making any sense.

A mix of emotions churned in my gut.

I couldn't tear my eyes away from her—her lips, still slick with blood; her eyes wide with panic now that she'd seen me; her fangs, still bared as if ready to bite again.

A sickening realization settled in, and my anger twisted into something else—something colder, more calculating.

My muscles tensed, my fists clenching at my sides. I wanted to pull her away from him, to shake her and demand what the hell she was doing. But I couldn't move, caught between the instinct to protect and the instinct to flee. I could feel my pulse pounding in my temples, the weight of the moment pressing down on me.

Her gaze met mine, and I saw something flash in her eyes—fear.

Oh?

She knew she'd been caught. The mask had slipped. And in that brief, raw moment, I realized she wasn't the person I thought she was. She was something...else.

Something dangerous.

...

But was she? I never got that kind of feeling from her

I swallowed hard, trying to steady my breath, my voice, anything. But all I could manage was, "What are you?" I asked, "Are you a vampire?"

>>Izel

Seth's voice was low and sharp, his words laced with shock and disbelief. My heart stopped for a moment, then kicked into a frantic rhythm. I could see it on his face—he'd pieced it together. He'd seen the blood on my lips, the fangs, the unconscious boxer beneath me. And now, he had put it all together.