Still Hungry

Chapter Five

"So." Maddie said after a while.

"So... what?" Casey asked. She was sitting with her back against the tree trunk - one leg hanging off the side, the other stretched out in front.

"What about the humans?"

"Which humans?" Casey responded, confused. 

"The humans that saw-"

She trailed off, and Casey waited her for her to continue. When she didn't, Casey said, "Saw what?" 

Casey knew what she was referring to, but it was always important for a fledgling to come to terms with their new reality. A lot of times, when they didn't, they ended up trying to starve themselves. This usually results in fairly bloody attacks on humans. Sometimes, they purposely told humans (usually their former family and friends) about the supernatural existence. Both of which usually result in a chaos that would be dealt by either Rin or The Council.

"What about the humans who saw me attack that woman?" She forced out.

"I erased their memories of you. You don't have to worry." Casey lied, realizing that she'd forgotten. 

"What about their phones?"

"What?" Casey looked down at her, mildly confused.

She looked up at me from where she sat on the forest floor, cross legged. "Some of the humans had there phones out, and were probably filming me."

Casey paused, still confused, then remembering the information she'd gotten from some recent humans she went, "Oh yeah! Phones can record video now."

Maddie walked to the base of the tree and looked up at Casey, "You didn't know that?"

She shook her head.

"Where have you been living? Under a rock?" Maddie accused the elderly vampire.

"Maybe." Casey admitted. Maddie gave her a weird look. "What? I was kinda murdered and it took me forever to get Satan to let me out."

"Satan is real, too?" Maddie asked, trying to figure out which new information to focus on.

"Yeah," Casey replied. "We're friends."

"How did you become friends with Satan?" she asked.

"That is a long story." Casey dropped down from the tree, "Now, how about we get you some new clothes?"

"Uh. Sure..." she said, unsure.

"Great." Casey grabbed her wrist, then teleported them both back to the city, directly outside of a department store. "Come on." Casey dragged her in the store, and up to the front desk.

"Hello how may I help-" the cashier trailed off when she saw the dried blood on Maddie. "-you."

"I was wondering if you had any clothes that would fit her?" Casey nodded in Maddie's direction, whose red eyes were pulsing with mild bloodlust. Casey noticed this, and remembered that most fledglings have extreme difficulty keeping themselves calm around human beings. Playing it up in front of the human cashier, she said, "Pet, we talked about this. You have to say calm around humans, ok."

"How the hell am I supposed to do that?" she demanded through clenched teeth.

"Just calm down, and think about something else?" Casey suggested.

She started thinking about the forest, which was good. She was also thinking "Should we really be exposing ourselves to humans like this?"

Casey thought I'm going to wipe her mind after, and the security cameras - don't worry, then sent the thought to Maddie's mind.

She took an unnecessary deep breath, and nodded.

"Ok." Casey turned to the human again. "As I said, do you have anything that would fit her?"

She didn't speak, and was reaching for a shiny red phone.

"You don't wanna do that."

She tried to started dialing.

Casey sighed, and went into the humans mind, forcing her to drop the phone. It was pathetically easy - humans have such weak minds.When Casey removed the fear from the human's mind, she was much more compliant.

In almost no time at all, Maddie was wearing a clean pair of jeans, tank top, and hoodie - all in black. Casey insisted that proper vampires must blend in with the night. She still wore the same sneakers from before.

Before we left the store, Casey wiped the human's mind of the visit. She also left her with a set of compulsive instructions to destroy the security footage of us. 

"Come on," Casey dragged Maddie out of the store. They headed down the street, and entered an Apple Store.

"What are we doing here?" the fledgling asked.

"Apparently, I'm crawling out from under a rock."