Categories > Original > Fantasy
The Midnight Hour
0 ReviewsA vampire's return and first hunt in a city she has not visited in almost a century. Told from her point of view.
The fog wraps the city an eerie blanket of silence. I wait patiently on the street corner, watching as men and women hurry to and fro. I watch, as silently and unmoving as I have watched night after night. Year after year. In the distance I hear a bell toll the hour, its sound muffled by the fog. Midnight. The witching hour, though no one calls it that anymore. Just another tale lost with the passage of time. The sharp wailing of a siren blasts through the air, cutting through the silence of the city. Then just as abruptly as it came, it fades away.
This city had changed much since I was last here, but I found my old hunting grounds easily enough. Even though the buildings had changed, I navigated through these unfamiliar streets with a strong sense of déjà vu until I found them. The sent of many others linger in the city, but not here. They dare not come here. Even though I had not been back in almost a century, something kept them away. Even the younger, foolhardy ones dare not come here.
The sound of a door slamming shut moves me out of my reverie. Below the glowing neon signs of a bar named Jackson's I see him stagger away. He's been drinking. But not for pleasure or because of some addiction or any other foolish reason mortals feel the need to drink. This one is different. He drinks in the hope of drowning out the voices that haunt his every waking and sleeping moment. He hopes that by the time he reaches unconsciousness they will have left him alone. But they never do.
I slowly follow him to his small dilapidated apartment a few blocks away. I walk silently, keeping to the shadows. He never evens suspects that he is being followed. He fumbles through his jacket pocket, searching for his keys. Unable to find them he curses violently and slams his fist against the door frame.
"Lost something James?" my voice whispers from the shadows behind him.
He whirls around in confusion, only to meet the deadly embrace of a vampire. His sweet, succulent blood floods my mouth. My mind ignites with images and sensations that are not my own. Flashes of a small house with a white picket fence. A young woman unconscious on the floor, bruises covering her face. The white sterile walls of a hospital. Bottles of beer littering the floor of a small apartment. A woman wearing cheap dollar store makeup. And over it all his sensation of confusion and eventually fear. His eyes slowly grow dull as the last drop of his blood falls through my lips.
I let his body fall to the ground, propped up against the door frame. The old woman down the hall will find him tomorrow morning. Licking the last drop of blood of my lips I slowly make my way outside. I melt into the dark corners of the city, becoming just another shadow in a vast city.
This city had changed much since I was last here, but I found my old hunting grounds easily enough. Even though the buildings had changed, I navigated through these unfamiliar streets with a strong sense of déjà vu until I found them. The sent of many others linger in the city, but not here. They dare not come here. Even though I had not been back in almost a century, something kept them away. Even the younger, foolhardy ones dare not come here.
The sound of a door slamming shut moves me out of my reverie. Below the glowing neon signs of a bar named Jackson's I see him stagger away. He's been drinking. But not for pleasure or because of some addiction or any other foolish reason mortals feel the need to drink. This one is different. He drinks in the hope of drowning out the voices that haunt his every waking and sleeping moment. He hopes that by the time he reaches unconsciousness they will have left him alone. But they never do.
I slowly follow him to his small dilapidated apartment a few blocks away. I walk silently, keeping to the shadows. He never evens suspects that he is being followed. He fumbles through his jacket pocket, searching for his keys. Unable to find them he curses violently and slams his fist against the door frame.
"Lost something James?" my voice whispers from the shadows behind him.
He whirls around in confusion, only to meet the deadly embrace of a vampire. His sweet, succulent blood floods my mouth. My mind ignites with images and sensations that are not my own. Flashes of a small house with a white picket fence. A young woman unconscious on the floor, bruises covering her face. The white sterile walls of a hospital. Bottles of beer littering the floor of a small apartment. A woman wearing cheap dollar store makeup. And over it all his sensation of confusion and eventually fear. His eyes slowly grow dull as the last drop of his blood falls through my lips.
I let his body fall to the ground, propped up against the door frame. The old woman down the hall will find him tomorrow morning. Licking the last drop of blood of my lips I slowly make my way outside. I melt into the dark corners of the city, becoming just another shadow in a vast city.
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