Katera

Chapter 11: A Problem Arises

"Now I must be going. Also, would you mind an escort, since you probably don't know your way around this city?" Maria asked Adari as she looked at him with loving eyes.

"I'd like that." Adari responded taking her hand as they began walking.

They continued walking hand in hand all the way to Alinn Park. They finally stopped when they had gotten to Maria's car. Maria then advised him to enter in vehicle and that she drive. Adari had no objections, so he followed through with her advisement. As they drove through the streets, Adari for the most part just gazed at Maria as she shifted the steering wheel left and right. When they finally arrived at Maria's apartment complex, Maria parked the car in the parking lot.

"Well, we're here." She stated cheerfully and they both got out of the vehicle.

Adari walked Maria up to her doorstep. "So here we are, this is where you live?"

"Yes, and where you live is strait through the woods over there." She pointed to where she was talking about.

"So you live rather close to me?"

"I guess you could say that."

"Thank you for the escort, and sleep well Maria."

"I will, and you have a good rest of the night."

"I will certainly try, but it may be hard since you won't be there."

Maria blushed then gave him a kiss on the cheek goodbye.

He then walked off towards the woods. When he finally got back to Katera, Suri greeted him.

"Welcome back your majesty. Are you doing any better?"

"Indeed I am, looks like taking a walk to clear my mind was all I needed. Thank you for the advise Suri." Adari responded happily.

"You're welcome."

The next day, Maria woke up to someone knocking at her door. She threw on a robe over her pajamas, and sleepily walked to the door. She opened the door as soon as she got there, and was surprised to see who it was. "Rachel? What are you doing here? I thought you never wanted to see me again." She said with a yawn.

Rachel completely standing there completely out of breath and gasping for air as she spoke "I know, but I had to come to you. I ran all the way here to tell you that I'm sorry."

"You came to apologise? Why?" Maria responded barely awake.

"For calling you a liar yesterday. I now know that I'm the one who was wrong."

"Rachel, what are you talking about?" Maria replied with a confused look on her face.

"Jessie, when you she was killed by vampires. I now know you were telling me the truth. Vampires are real."

"You believe me? Wait..what?!" Maria said now fully awake. "How did you come to find that vampires are real?"

"Don't tell you haven't seen it, it's everywhere, in the news and all over social media."

"Can you give me a minute Rachel?"

"Sure."

Maria let Rachel into her apartment, then went to her room and changed out of her pajamas and into normal clothes and went back to the room Rachel was waiting in. "What is you were talking about?" Maria asked in determination.

"There was news of a vampire attack in an alleyway downtown. The whole thing was caught on camera. See look." Rachel get out her phone to show Maria the news broadcast. She handed her phone to Maria so she could watch it.

Maria took Rachel's phone and started watching the broadcast.

A news reporter then began speaking on the broadcast. "Last last night in a downtown alley an astonishing event occured. As you can see here it was all caught on camera, unfortunately the camera feed went out after the attack." The reporter shows the video then continues speaking. "At first glance, this may just seem like a brutal attack. But if you look closer the attacker, you'll notice that this is no ordinary person, but instead a vampire. Though authorities try to deny this was a possibility, but the camera doesn't lie. This vampire killed the person by draining them of blood. Now we should be on high alert. Just because this happened once doesn't it won't or can't happen again. Next time, one may not be enough for their satisfaction." Maria stopped the video.

"Wow, that is definitely..something." Maria responded in an unsure tone.

"I thought since you knew where to find vampires, like you said yesterday. We can tell the others, so we can get rid of them before they kill us all." Rachel inferred

"How do you know they want to kill us? Maybe that vampire didn't mean to kill that person. What if they were starving and couldn't stop themself from taking their blood. It may have just been accident, we don't know that it was intentional." Maria replied with a lack of confidence.

"Going by the video, it looks pretty intentional. Besides the camera doesn't lie."

"Well, sights can be deceiving. Honestly, we don't know what we saw on that video. It was so dark out, you can't watch it and just assume what you think you perceived is 100% true." She said in defense with her arms crossed.

"You know what? I think you're just trying to defend that vampire. Which doesn't make any sense since, according to you, a vampire killed Jessie."

"I know that. It's just.."

"Of course, you're hiding something Maria."

"Now she's on to me. What am I supposed to do? I can't tell where the city is she probably tell the government or state officials about it. Then they'd go out into the woods and try to kill all the vampires. Then I'd be the one to blame, for the attempted massacre that was a dramatically failed and Adari would never forgive me. Then I'd become the most-hated person he knows." Maria thought to herself. "Rachel, I..I can't tell you."

"If that's the way you're going to be..then I shall be going." Rachel said, then she stood and walked out the front door.

"She left? Strange, she's usually more determined to get answers." Maria looked outside but didn't see Rachel and presumed she'd already left the premise. "When dusk comes, I should probably warn Adari about this. I know doesn't seem like much of anything right now, doesn't mean it can't become a potential problem for him later."

Hours passed before the sun had set. When dusk finally came, Maria left her apartment with her bow and arrows, and looked around to make sure no one was around to see her leave. When she was sure, she made off toward the woods and checked behind to make sure she wasn't being followed.

She continued through woods until she heard a branch snap behind her. Maria readied her bow as she turned around to see what she was up against. "Rachel. What are you doing here?"

"I followed you to find out what you were hiding from me. Also you should watch where you're pointing that arrow, I don't want you to stab me with it."

"Oh, sorry. Also Rachel you should go back."

"I can't go back, I don't know the way back. Wherever you go I'm going or else I'll get lost."

"I guess it's not that bad, if I take her to Adari, maybe he can erase her memory or something." Maria thought to herself. "Fine, i guess you can come along."

"Thanks, Maria."

So the two, continued walking through the woods as Maria led the way.

Maria didn't how things would go down when they would get to Katera, she just hoped things would go better than they did with Jessie. But Maria didn't let this bother her. She thought "After all, I am just bringing Rachel to Katera, just to ask to have her memory erased. So what could go wrong?"