Mesmerized | ✓

30

How do you kill a vampire-mermaid hybrid?

Taking into account Yuli's claims that he was not a vampire, should you just treat him as a regular human being, and therefore a stab with a sharp knife in the chest would be sufficient? But then again, Yuli wasn't human. Do you slay him by piercing through his heart with an aspen stake? Do you sprinkle him with a healthy doze of Holy Water and hope it burns him like acid? Do you decapitate him and then burn his body? Or maybe all that you have to do is shove a crucifix into his face and hope that it will just scare him into going back to the sea? Well, whatever the answer was the only thing they knew for certain was that drowning him was out of the question.

In the end, Carl and Mark deduced that it wouldn't hurt to have all those weapons with them. A few aspen stakes, knievs, two bottles of Holy Water taken from the nearby church, two crucifixes and an igniter. Mark was the most excited about that last thing as he flicked it on and off with a sinister smile on his face. "Let's burn this motherfucker." He said in a low voice as he put the igniter down on his bed and stepped back to take a photo of their equipment.

Carl rolled his eyes trying to keep himself from picturing all the ways in which Mark could kill Yuli but it was to no avail. They had agreed that it would be better if the reporter dealt him the final blow as Carl had a strong feeling that he wouldn't be able to do it. "Are you going to take a picture right before you kill him too?" Carl asked.

"You bet." Mark said in a very excited voice. "This will make my career. Can you even imagine this, Carl? No one has ever, in all history of humankind, had a story better than this one!" It was as if he was high on drugs but Carl was relieved that Mark was excited about this and not scared and doubtful like he was. As if hearing his thoughts, Mark looked at him. "You're not going to turn on me at the last second, are you?" He asked.

"No." Carl said flatly. He wasn't planning to but he still wasn't sure what he would do if it came to actually taking care of Yuli. He wasn't about to say that to Mark, though.

"Well, I hope so." Mark said side-eyeing him, as he turned on the camera and started telling his future viewers about the plan at which Carl couldn't help but groan.

*****

The day had come. While all the people were very public about going to the prom, Robin had to be more inconspicuous. The dress and her mask were tucked away in the back of her closet and she didn't dare to speak about her plans of going out to neither Carl nor her parents. She planned her make-up carefully, watching Youtube tutorials and reading online articles.

There was just one thing left to take care of. An amazing hairstyle. But for that Robin needed to find an excuse to talk to Yuli. It was hard to contact him as he wasn't best friends with his cell phone as most of the people their age and when he did use the phone it was her brother's. The foolproof method of getting his insight was to just go the Silver Fox and simply ask him face to face.

Too preoccupied with whatever he was doing in his room, Carl didn't notice Robin quietly walk past his door. Her parents also paid her no mind as they decided to use the time that had suddenly fallen onto their hands to clean out the basement. Which left Robin with her make-up kit free to leave the house unnoticed. She only hoped that they wouldn't need her for anything until she came back.

Robin cast a longing look at her car parked in the driveway knowing that using it would attract too much attention and started walking down the sidewalk. With the public transport basically not working due to the bus drivers being either already infatuated with the mysterious persona behind the viral video that made the town go crazy or they were too scared of the alleged serial killer (who coincidentally happened to one and the same person). This left Robin with no choice but to go on foot.