Dog Fights

Chapter 34; Aubade

Ezra screams as Leon jumps, the force of the bullet knocking his body to the side with his teary eyes still wide open. Crimson begins to ooze from the wound, soaking the sand around Leon's head and making Ezra's vision cloud with red.

Ezra drops to his knees, finally allowed to move even though the two men hold tight to his arms. His body is numb, pinpricks of fried nerves jolting his system when he's unable to take his eyes away from the corpse across from him.

"Let him go," Orgon's says, voice echoing against the metal walls before finding its way to Ezra. The room feels empty besides the two of them, as if all the people in the bleachers vanished with the gunshot.

Ezra staggers to his feet as the men release his arms, watching Orgon step away before he falls at Leon's side. He stares down, lip beginning to quiver as his hand pauses in front of the teen's bruised and dirty face. Dark crimson had started to drop from his hairline and into his eye.

Ezra reaches down with bloody hands, chest beginning to heave with choked sobs as he grips Leon's shoulders and carefully pulls him onto his folded knees. His head rolls, only making Ezra's expression twist with agony.

He brushes the hair from Leon's forehead, unable to see through the tears falling from his eyes and onto the younger's cheek. He couldn't do anything, and just watched. He could only watch.

"Relax, kid," Orgon says, voice muffled and unsteady in Ezra's ears, "he's gonna wake up- just give him a few minutes."

"I, I could k-kill you," Ezra stutters, hugging Leon's body close and squeezing his eyes shut, "I could kill you right now."

Orgon smiles sadly, tilting his head. "But you won't," he says quietly. His voice is painful to listen to. "You can't. All you're going to is sob over your claim's corpse until he wakes up and kills you. You won't defend yourself, because you can't hurt him."

Orgon slowly lowers himself into a crouch, leaning his elbows on his knees as he studies Leon's face. "Isn't it just a bitch, claiming someone and then having to defend them with your life?" he asks, "and when they die- then what? How do you continue on when you didn't do the one job your instincts were screaming at you to do?

"This is why I kept you under my watch," Orgon says, hissing his words through his teeth,  "you were free for less than a week and decided to attach yourself to some poor kid. Is this how you want innocent lives to end? Look at what you did to him. The only reason he's in this mess is because of you."

Ezra chokes on another sob, hiding his face the best he can in Leon's shoulder. Even though the man that killed him is within arms reach he has no desire to attack. He no longer wants to reach forward and claw out Orgon's throat, or tear his head from his body. He just wants to sit in the deafening silence his mind created for him, and try to wipe the sand and blood from Leon's face.

"Oh, would you look at that," Orgon says with a smile, gesturing to Leon, "his eyes are blue now. Isn't that the telltale sign of a fledgling? A vampire that's never fed? I think he's going to wake up soon."

Ezra pulls away, swiping drying blood across his face as he wipes the tears from his eyes. Even though he's struggling to believe it, Orgon's right. Leon's irises had shifted from hazel to crystal blue while he wasn't looking, only making his wide eyes look even bigger. Orgon really had turned him into a fledgling before putting a bullet through his brain, but that severe of a wound would put such a strain on his body.

Fledglings are vampires who have yet to feed, and because of that they tend to be extremely violent and unstable. Vampires use human blood to function and heal, but Leon's veins have just been flooded with venom. He needs something else before he'll be able to think straight again, or be able to resist the urge to feed or fight.