Food vendors filled the hallways of some generic academic building. I saw cookies and cakes and puddings and ice cream everywhere I looked. Insatiable cravings plagued me. Try as I might, I could not shake the desire for a chocolate chip cookie. At last, I gave in and purchased one at least 6 inches in diameter. I snuck back to my room and nibbled it dejectedly under the covers. Its chocolate was delicious, but the guilt put a bitter taste in my mouth.
When I had finished, I made my way back to the vendors. However, not long after I returned, a queer sensation coursed through me. Something within me was changing, and I did not know what. Fortunately for me, the young man that appeared out of nowhere and insisted that I follow him to his car before the transformation finished seemed to know what was going on.
"Have you been following me?" I accused as he led me off.
"A bit yeah. Be glad I did," he replied. A driver pulled a black sedan up to the building exit. The man
buckled me into the backseat, wrapped me in a blanket, popped into the passenger seat, and we were off.
"Would you please tell me why I'm in your car?" I muttered, struggling against sudden grogginess.
"You're turning into a vampire. If we don't get you to a coven quickly, there'll be hell to pay."
It all made sense. After all, not reporting a fledgling vampire to a coven would be like having a baby and not reporting the birth. The only difference is the baby sucks blood. I went on to ramble incoherently for half an hour or so in a sleepy delirium.
"I should probably stop talking, shouldn't I?"
"That would be nice," snipped the man. Another half hour passed, this time in silence. "Look, I didn't mean to offend you. You didn't have to stop completely."
"It's fine. I was just wondering, why help me when I might try to drink you?"
"If you were lost, and a talking hamburger could give you directions, would you eat it? Anyway, we're almost there. When we get inside, there will be lots of people that aren't vampires wandering around just to confuse us. Vampires are notoriously antisocial, so you won't see a group of 30 or more of them just hanging around. Wait until we've gone as deep down and as far away from crowds as we can before saying anything about what you are."
We climbed out of the car in front of a large, old fashioned building. The man guided me inside where a crowd of men in golden robes huddled around a table, discussing either stocks or battle plans. We swept past them and took a long spiral staircase down into the building's bowels. The number of people decreased along with our anonymity. By three flights down, the people we did see made it quite clear that they saw us too. One elegant man on his way up rushed towards me, a sadistic grin exposing his pointed teeth. I held my ground. When he reached our step, he realized that I did not have a drop of blood in me. I smiled back, exposing fangs of my own. After he had passed, I turned excitedly to my mortal guide, whispering "Oh my gosh! That was another vampire!"
"Yes, it's wonderful. Keep going."
At long last, we reached the basement where an elaborate tent like that of some medieval king had been set up. A distinguished looking man dressed all in dark blue stepped out of it to greet us.
"No one around, deep underground, fancy tent. Are you the head vampire?" I asked.
"Indeed I am. You must be newly turned. It is a pleasure," he replied, then spoke to my companion, "Thank you for bringing her to us. You may go. I promise you safe passage." The man said goodbye and hurried away, leaving me with the vampire king. "When did you become a vampire, my dear?"
"Like an hour ago. Heck, I haven't even drunk blood yet," I answered, smiling uncontrollably. I was completely geeking out.
"Ah, where are my manners! Come inside. I'd be honored to mix you a drink." We went inside the tent, and he set about squeezing fruit juice and dropping berries into a chalice of blood.
"I thought vampires couldn't have anything besides blood."
"And who told you such nonsense? A cat is a carnivore, but it can enjoy apples. We are sanguivores," he explained as he scooped the stuff that makes sour gummies sour into the drink, "but we have a taste for the exotic." I accepted the chalice and drank without hesitation.
"Wow! That's fantastic!" I exclaimed. The king took a seat across from me, and smiled all too knowingly. "What's that face about?" I asked.
"Oh, you will make an excellent vampire."
Slightly disconcerted but excited nevertheless, I dove into a conversation on vampire covens. At some point, we left the tent to meet other vampires. The next time I went into the tent, it had changed. Wet, twisted ropes of linen were piled up in one corner for no apparent reason. Books and maps lined the walls. When I started to ask what had happened, I found myself face to face with a scruffy haired boy about my age.
"My dad says you can stay in this tent as long as you like. We have some snack if your hungry," he offered. Dream logic told me that not only was he the son of the vampire king, but the vampire king was now a werewolf and so was I and everyone else. We chowed down together on beef and raw oysters while the werewolf king and some advisers planned an attack on the vampire coven, which apparently still existed, just somewhere else.
Suddenly, an enormous group of color coded werewolves tried to attack the tent to overthrow the king. The prince, the king, and the advisers all slipped off their robes, went into werewolf form, and faced their opponents outside. I had to hang back before taking my clothes off so I could shape shift. My life might have been in danger, but that's hardly a reason for immodesty. When I finally got outside, I realized that we were all actually Live Action Role Playing. The attacking werewolves were pieces of paper that our characters had to flip over to indicate we had killed them. As soon as the battle ended, a bunch of the red, green, blue, and yellow factions had been taken prisoner, and I got dressed, everything became reality again instead of a game.
Before long, the king received a threatening message from the head vampire. "We are coming for the vampire werewolf's ring. The only safe hiding place for it is in her memories. Muahahaha!" Surprise surprise, I was the vampire werewolf. I looked at my hands, and sure enough, I had a silver ring. In retrospect, that should have killed me, being a werewolf and all.
"I don't understand," I gasped, "I distinctly remember taking the ring off and leaving it somewhere in the vampire camp."
"I've got it!" cried the King, "The vampire said it's only safe in your memories, right? It must be that you have a psychic connection to the ring and can summon it to you if you displace it. Maybe you can send it away somewhere else too!"
"That explains the damp towels!" realized the prince. No one else followed. "We can use them to spell a word as a channel for her. For instance, the vampires think we're savages. So we should spell that out and have her send it that way!"
It made as much sense as anything else. The problem was, we could not figure out how to spell savages. After attempting schaveges, scafages, scavages, safadges, and others, I got fed up with it and looked in one of the many dictionaries inside the tent. Apparently, the werewolves were almost entirely illiterate.
Then, I woke up...sort of. I scurried off to class and ran into a fellow classmate on the way.
"Hey, I just wanted you to know that I decided to write my analysis paper on your vampire king character."
"Really? I'm flattered. I just dreamed up some more to the story last night, so I can give it to you if you need it."
"Wait, that's all coming from dreams? Dang girl, how do you get so lucky?"
At that point, I noticed a federal agent trailing us, or more specifically me. "Hang on, Mickie. I've got to do something before I forget." I whipped out my phone, ran a quick program, and smirked when the agent's earpiece exploded. I knew that whatever machine the earpiece had fed back to had also taken a hit. A day or so later, someone in the FBI sauntered into the office of a man at the end of his rope.
"I heard the girl got you demoted," he jibed.
"I'm not demoted! I've just been...down played."
"Yeah, tell that to your paycheck. See you around."
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