Poison: Origin

It's been eight days since I first came to Ouroboros Manor. Medic's Ointment really worked. I only have small scars now. Eleanor, Nathan and I are very close friends. Elle is so cute. She always wears that same Chinese outfit. When I asked why, it turned out that it was the uniform her master chose for her. Nathan is so nice to me. He's like the brother I never had.

Ezekiel and me have a weird relationship. Every time we get close, we always do something weird that makes things awkward for us. When that happens he always distances himself from me. Once he walked in on me taking a shower from Nathan's room. He didn't talk to me the rest of the day. I'm not sure if it was because of the awkwardness or something else.

I learned more about The Company. They've existed since the beginning of the human race, only they weren't as big as they are now. The United States government knows about The Company and the existence of mythological creatures but don't do anything about it. They leave it to The Company, since thats what their good at, and they don't cause human casualties. It's only the government's job to keep the existence of The Company and vampires a secret.

The Company recruits young members so they can be properly trained. Members are called Hunters, since they hunt vampires and other creatures. They start as a lowly Rank 5 and move all the way to Masters, where they can basically do whatever they want. Nathan, Ezekiel, and Eleanor are all Rank 2. Until recently, when Ez was promoted. He didn't tell me why though. Everything stayed the same, except all his green jackets were replaced with white ones and the emerald eyes on his Ouroboros pendant were switched to diamonds.

Hunters have uniforms that they use in battle, according to their rank. Rank 5 use black, Rank 4 use red, Rank 3 use blue, Rank 2 use green, and Rank 1 use white. Masters can use anything they want. The uniform has to be their rank color as a shirt or jacket.

Hunters form squads when they hunt. No one, but masters, are allowed to hunt alone. Elle told me, though, that her master took her to hunt a Class 1 vampire once. I learned about their enemies too. Elle took me to see the manor leader, Artemis, to learn about vampires.

Artemis, was an a young. Not as young as Nathan, but still pretty young. He was thirty when they transfered him from Germany to become a leader here at Ouroboros Manor. He told me that if he died suddenly, the next in line for his post was Arthur.

Artemis told me that, like hunters have ranks, vampires have classes. There were 7 vampire classes. The weakest vampires were the class 6 while the strongest were the class 1. After Artemis was done explaining, I told him I still didn't understand. He gave me a sheet with the vampire classes, how rare they were, and a few facts.

I skimmed the paper:

Dr. Shadow's Vampire Class List
(summarized)

Class 6:
Newborns who refuse to drink blood, have minimal powers that they refuse to use, long for death, those who refuse death join hunter groups.
rarity rank: 5

Class 5:
Newborns who drink blood constantly to feed their new thirst, don't care about being discovered, have minimal powers that the don't know how to use:
healing
heightened senses, agility, and strength
rarity rank: 3

Class 4:
Vampires who embrace their vampire ways, don't want to be discovered, don't like humans, drink blood whenever possible, have minimal supernatural powers:
healing
shape shifting - only the faces of the people they've killed
super senses, agility, and strength
rarity rank: 1

Class 3:
Vampires who reject their vampire ways, don't have to hide, mix in well with humans, somewhat apathetic, only drink harvested blood, most join hunter groups, , have minimal supernatural powers:
minimal healing
heightened senses, agility, and strength
rarity rank: 6

Class 2:
Vampires who have very little empathy, drink fresh blood often to keep their powers, don't want to be discovered by humans, have with supernatural powers:
healing
minimal illusions
shape shifting - only into the victims they've killed
minimal telepathy
super senses, agility, and strength
rarity rank: 8

Class 1:
Vampires who lack empathy, drink fresh blood constantly, and don't care about being discovered, have supernatural powers:
super healing
minimal force fields
shape shifting - only into those they've tasted
telepathy
illusions
teleporting
super senses, agility, and strength
rarity rank: 10

Class 0:
A special breed of vampires called Hollows, Hollows drink blood to steal the souls of others, don't need anything to survive, have no emotion and consider themselves gods, have unlimited supernatural powers:
super healing
illusions
minimal elemental magic
force fields
shape shifting - limitless
teleporting
telepathy
super senses, agility, and strength
rarity rank: currently none known

Artemis told me no one has a survived an encounter with a Hollow. The Company only knows of their powers because they caught one on tape brutally killing a Master hunter. Leon was a Class 2. Was he even looking for me anymore? It's only been about a week. Maybe I was just a meal. . .

I was in my bed reading the paper again. I had a small wardrobe were I kept all clothes they gave me. I heard the bathroom door open slowly. When I looked up, Nathan was there.

"Ez and Elle are sparring." He said. "You want to go?"

"It's not like I have anything else to do," I said putting the paper to the side. He motioned me to follow.

We walked around the manor. The first time I explored Ouroboros was with Elle, but she basically zoomed past everything. Ez showed me the stable were they raised real expensive Friesen horses, that they sold to make spare money. One would cost over 125 thousand. Ez and me had a nice time that day which led to him not talking to me again.

"Keep up," Nathan said. We were practically jogging down the halls.

"Whats the hurry?" my breathing was getting faster.

"Elle likes to finish things quickly," Nathan explained. He expected me to believe that a little ten year old girl could beat a grown seventeen year old?

Nathan pulled me into a part of the manor that I've never been to. The was a long hall with doors on each side.

"This is were the Master's rooms are," he said. Behind one of these doors was Elle's Master's room. "They like to be close to the sparring grounds."

At the very end were a huge pair of double doors. As we came closer I noticed what was on it. Sculpted onto it were people, hundreds of people, suffering. The doors were beautiful, but at the same time, haunting.

"Isn't it magnificent," I heard Nathan say. I was too busy looking at the doors in awe. "It's a replica of Auguste Rodin's The Gates of Hell. Artemis had it built, I guess he knew what he was doing." he finished with a smile. I walked forward ready to touch the cold metal. Somehow it looked familiar.

"It depicts the Inferno section of Dante Alighieri's The Divine Comedy." he said. So thats why it looked familiar. My English teacher showed us a picture of the original. This was a replica so it was essentially the same.

"I'm reading The Divine Comedy at school," I said. In the past eight days I haven't felt more homesick than I did now. What was Emily doing right now? How was Nikky? I wonder how worried my mom is. She's probably called the National Gard about my disappearance. Unless The Company is covering my absence and my mom doesn't even know I'm gone. "Or I was reading it," I corrected.

"Come on," Nathan said noticing my mood drop. He grabbed my hand and pushed the doors open.

Inside there was a small hall which led into a room three times the size of the school's gym. There were two doors opposite to each other on small hallway. We walked past the small hallway into the big room. There were bleachers on all sides of the room.

In one corner of the room were a group of people surrounding Ez. A few yards away was Elle, by herself. She had two metal folding fans that were basically as big as she was. Elle was slowly moving them through the air, as if doing some kind of dance.

Nathan pulled me into the bleachers. We sat down near the middle. I could see the group of guys encouraging Ez, with small pats and comments. Some of the guys threw Elle some offensive gestures. Elle only smiled.

"Why is there a lot of people coming in?" I asked as I saw people come in the same way we had and sit in the empty bleachers.

"Not a lot of people like Eleanor," He said. All these people came to see a teenager beat up a little girl!?

"Why!?"

"She's bred hunter, therefore favored by Master hunters as a student. Right now she's being trained by the best Master hunter in The Company, and that makes most of the other hunters jealous," Nathan said. On of the guys crowding Ez stepped back and blew a whistle. The crowd stepped back and went to the bleachers. One of them handed Ez a katana. The only time I saw him fight was with a halberd, so I figured that the hunters knew how to use more than one weapon.

"Whats going on?" I asked when nothing happened. I expected them to quickly start off at each other, like what I saw that day, but they only stood there waiting for the other.

"When you're alone in combat, you only have one shot so you have to be completely sure about what you're doing." He explained. I looked at Ez. He was shifting his grip on the sword, trying to figure from where to grab it. "In this case, whoever hits the floor fist loses, so you can't make a mistake."

"But Elle doesn't even have a weapon!" I said.

"My little Elle can make a weapon out of anything. Thats how she's taught." I heard. I turned to see a Asian lady in her late fifties. She was dressed in a similar outfit to Elle's. Next to her was Medic.

"Lady Lin," Nathan said in respect. Lin sat down next to me on the bleachers. She had dark hair and dark eyes. "Hello, Medic." he greeted.

"This should be easy for my little Eleanor," Lin said beaming with pride.

"This is Master Hunter Lin, Elle's Master," Medic explained. "Lady Lin, this is Eliana, she's here because Snake confused her for a vampire."

"Yes, I heard of that. Ezekiel was in charge of your squad at the time, am I correct?" Lin didn't look at anyone when she was talking. Her gaze, like that of a mother's, didn't move from Elle.

"Yes," Nathan answered.

"So Arthur was right in punishing him then. What happened to Snake?" she asked. Snake, I hate that guy. It was his fault I was here in the first place.

"He transfered in embarrassment," Nathan explained. The guy on the floor whistled again and quickly stepped out into the bleachers. "So what have you-"

"Silence, it's begun." Lin said nodding towards the floor.

Elle closed her fans and brought them down to her sides. Ez stared at Elle as if trying to anticipate her first move. Elle simply stood there, her closed fans at her sides and her gray eyes shinning with innocence. Everyone here knew not to believe her eyes.

Ez, moved first. He charged at Elle at full speed. I gasped when I saw Elle not do anything. Ez moved quickly covering the distance between the two. When he was close he brought his sword up to his chest. He was going to impale her!

At the very last moment Elle pulled up on of the closed fans over her head and slammed it hard on the sword, causing it to impale itself on the floor. Elle then brought the other closed fan up hard hitting Ez on the chin as he fell forward after his sword. He let go of his weapon with the impact. The blow lifted Ez off his feet and threw him on his back a few feet away.

The whole room went silent. Nobody even moved. The only thing that could be heard was Ez's groans of pain. Beside me Lin was smiling with satisfaction. Medic moved first. He ran down the almost empty bleachers, with his case in hand, to Ez. Everyone started whispering after this.

Nathan and Lin got up - I followed. We went over to congratulate Elle. When we came she smiled and started jumping up and down in joy.

"Did you see that! I'm better than him!" she cheered happily.

"I see my training didn't go to waste," Lin said coldly. Elle beamed. "But you were sluggish in your movements." Lin harshly said. Elle's face fell. "Your recklessness could cost you your life when you are on your own."

"But Elle beat him in like three moves!" I defended Elle. The little girl smiled at me. Lin glared at me, her stare cold and cruel. What happened to the proud mother-like figure I met a few seconds ago?!

Nathan put a hand on my shoulder. I looked over at him. He was shaking his head at me, telling me not to say another word. I shrugged his hand off, but didn't say anything else. Lin broke her glare and stormed off.

"Elle, that was amazing!" I said once Lin was out of hearing range. The little girl returned to her previous cheerful personality.

"Thank you!" she said in high pitched voice. She looked in Ez's direction. Medic put a bandage on his chin, then helped him stand up. Medic indicated for Ez to put a hand on his chin, when he did they began to walk out of the room. The crowd left when they did, some glared at Elle. "I just hope I didn't hurt him too much."

_______________________________________________________________________

"You broke my fucking jaw!" Ez said to us the next night. His head was bandaged vertically giving his jaw limited movement.

"You challenged me!" Elle said petting Luxuria. We were in my room, or Ez's old room. Nine days now. I was starting to think I was never going home.

"You didn't have to hit me so hard!" Ez said massaging his chin. I laughed. It was weird how these guys distracted me so much from home.

"Stop being a whiny bitch!" Elle yelled causing Luxuria to jump from her lap. Elle had a mouth, you don't even you. She toned it down in public though. Emily cussed a lot too, just not in school. Our school gave Saturday school if you cussed. Emily once spat offensive language at a teacher. She was suspended for three days.

"You little brat!" Ez stood up from his seat.

"Fuck up!" Elle responded.

"Do they always fight like this?" I asked Nathan, who was watching the show with interest, like me.

"No," he answered. I looked at him surprised. Was he serious? "They're worse,"

"Look see this!" Ez walked to the closet and pulled something from the top shelf. "Wow" he said in overexaggerated amazement brought down a pair of shoes. "Look, look, look, look," he said quickly. He put the shoes back on the top shelf. "Isn't that just amazing Eleanor? How things go so neatly on the top shelf?!"

Elle's cheeks huffed. I laughed. She wasn't tall enough to reach the top shelfs.

"At least I don't lose fights against little girls," Elle responded with a smile and crossed her little arms.

"At least I'm not an abomination," Ez said smugly. Elle's smile faded. That was a low blow, he was insulting Elle's selective breeding.

"Ez, thats enough," Nathan stood between the two. Elle's icy eyes began to tear. I quickly ran up to her and hugged her.

"Don't listen to him Elle," I whispered. It's good thing the crying effect was only for people my age, or older.

"Elle, I'm sorry." I heard Ez. Elle detached herself from me. "It came out wrong."

"It's okay, I'm used to it," she said bitterly. "It was just sudden, thats all."

"Why don't we play a game?" I said in an effort to lighten the mood. Elle nodded. "What game do you want to play?"

"Follow the arrow," Elle muttered.

"I'll get the chalk," Nathan sighed and left the room.

"That such a childish game," Ez scoffed. I glared at him. If it would make Elle feel better, then thats what we were playing.

"Who's hiding and who's looking?" Nathan asked coming back into the room with a box of chalk.

"I wanna hide with Nathan!" Elle said, returning to her childish personality slightly.

"So me and Eli are looking," Ez rolled his eyes. Elle grabbed a chalk piece and ran out of the room, Luxuria following closely behind. Nathan laughed and grabbed a piece of chalk and left the room in the same direction Elle had.

"So how do we play?" I asked. I've never heard of follow the arrow. Ez stared at me with a disbelieving look.

"Are you serious?" he said skeptically. I nodded my head. Did I just commit a crime or something? "It's basically hide and seek, except the hiders leave an arrow pointing in the direction they went, and you have to tag them when you find them." He explained.

"Whats the point of that?" I said. If we have arrows pointing in the direction we were supposed to go then what was the point of even hiding?

"Sometimes the arrows point in two directions and you have to guess which way to go." Now that made things a little more interesting. "Elle's pretty good at this game. She always drags Nathan into playing with her. He once spent two days following Elle's arrows."

"So can we start now?" I said. I wanted to find Elle so I could make fun of Nathan.

"Here," Ez said handing me his now diamond eyed Ouroboros pendant. "It has a tracker and I always tend to cheat." I laughed. I took it and put it around my neck. "Lets go then." Ez took my hand and took me outside the room. I felt warm when he took my hand, similar to Leon. "Look," He said still holding my hand. Along the wall was an arrow pointing to the other end of the wall. I turned to Ez, but he was looking at my hand, or our hands. I quickly let go.

"We should start looking for them." I said. Damn things were awkward again.

"Yeah. . ."

We walked down the hall in silence. My legs felt giddy and I felt happy with him. He made me feel like Leon did. Did I even like Leon anymore? He was a vampire, who probably wanted to kill me. I don't usually attach myself to serial killers. I've only known him for one day, then I haven't seen him in almost ten days. Yet, I couldn't stop thinking about him.

I my feet trip on something. I grabbed the closest thing next to me, which so happened to be Ez. I pulled him down with me, as I landed straight on my face. A few seconds later Ez fell on my back with a thud. I flipped as best I could under him, so that I was looking at him.

"Elle likes to set booby traps," he said nodding to what I tripped on. There were two shoelaces tied together, then tied to the two tables on both sides of the wall. Elle always wore boots, so that meant Nathan was barefoot.

As I brought my gaze back from the shoelaces, I saw Ez's blue eyes attentively staring at me. My heart beat faster. What was he doing?! He leaned in, his almost black hair covering his face. He was going to kiss me! Leon's face came into my mind. I found myself leaning up to meet his lips. I felt Leon's hot breath on my face. Leon brushed his lips against mine. I quickly pulled back.

"We should look for them," I said turning my head to the side. I didn't want to see Ez's disappointed face. I don't know what was weirder, the fact that someone like Ez wanted to kiss me, or the fact that I pictured Leon's face when he was.

"Yeah," he said standing up. He offered his hand, I guiltily took it. I gave Leon such a hard time about these kind of things. Ez pulled me up.

"Just be, um, careful, Elle likes to set traps." Ez said again as though nothing had happened. He then started walking, not even bothering to wait for me. His pendant around my neck, suddenly felt heavier. I wouldn't be surprised if he didn't talk to me the whole time I was at Ouroboros after this. I sighed and followed him, looking at the ground in case Elle had decided to get more ideas.

When we came to the end of the hall there were two arrows. One was Elle's the other was Nathan's. Both of them pointed in both directions. So either Elle and Nathan separated, or they went the same direction to trick us. Either way we were going to have to separate.

"I'll follow this one," Ez mumbled, pointed to the yellow arrow, Nathan's arrow. Ez turned without another word following the arrow. So I was going to go after Elle.

_______________________________________________________________________

After several hours and backtracks I came to the hall going into the training room. I quietly sneaked past the Master Hunter rooms and came to the doors. Elle was there, closing The Gates of Hell. When she saw me she giggled and fully closed the doors.

I quickened my pace. Elle wasn't going to get away from me so easily. I came to The Gates of Hell and slowly, I pushed them open. They made more noise than I wanted to, and I flinched. Looking around I saw no one had opened their doors in anger. I slipped in and closed the doors.

I was at the small hallway going into the bigger room, but all the lights were turned off. I walked forward till I got to the two doors on the opposite walls. On the floor between the two rooms was an arrow pointing to both rooms. There was no indication to which room she went in, so I chose the left one to go in first.

Once I opened the door all the lights in the room turned on. Inside were hundreds of weapons. On the walls, and on racks. They were arranged like library book shelves. On one of the first racks I saw the weapons Elle and Ez had used the day before. I noticed there was no guns in this armory. I almost forgot that hunters don't use guns. In a corner there were a bunch of helmets like the ones I saw Ez and Nathan wear that day. I still had to ask them what they did.

After a couple minutes of searching I didn't find Elle. So she had to be in the other room. I left the armory, crossed the small hall, and entered the other room.

This one had cages on both sides of the wall. I heard shuffling coming from the cages once I entered. It was too dark to tell what was in the cages and the cages had this unnatural darkness that cloaked whatever was in them. I wanted to turn and leave, but I saw an arrow on the floor pointing farther into the room. Elle had to be here, so it must be safe for me, but then again, Elle was a bred hunter.

"Elle?" I called out. There was more shuffling from the cages. It could be Elle, right? I walked down the hall without daring to look in one of the cages. I followed the arrows on the floor until I came to one with a star on it. I looked at the cages where the star was. The one on the right was open. If this was Elle's idea of a joke it wasn't funny. I was scared shitless.

I stepped into the cage. No wonder Nathan took a while finding Elle, this place was almost pitch black. I couldn't even see the back of the cage. I took cautious steps forward. I had a strange sense of deja vu.

Out of the darkness I saw two small orbs of silver. My steps quickened. When I was close enough I saw what was in the cage.

Elle was there but a monster was holding her tightly against it, lifting her small body off the ground. It's eyes shone with joy and hunger. Her head was awkwardly tilted to the side, her arms dangling at he sides. The monster had it's lips Elle's neck. The monster's glowing sliver gaze shifted to me, or rather what was around my neck. A small trickle of blood escaped it's lips and slid down Elle's neck.

"Leon. . ." I gasped.

The monster had a name.