Kill This Venom

I ran down the aisle without hesitation and burst through the front doors. Fortunately, there was still a blotch of orange in the sky; the sun wasn’t done with the day just yet. I looked around frantically and was surprised to find Nessa sitting on the floor, her back against the wall. She casually drummed her fingers against her knees, but stopped when she saw me.

“You changed your mind?” she lit up with a smile, and it vanished as quickly as it had appeared. She spotted the stake in my hand. “Or came to kill me first.”

“No! Nessa you can’t do this.”

“We discussed this already, David,” she shook her head, looked down, and then mumbled, “Shane.”

“They’re not going to turn you!” I hissed, walking over to her, wondering if they could hear me from behind the church. I ignored the name change. “Their plan is to eat you. They just wanted to make it interesting and try and get me, too.”

She smiled gently at me. Why was she smiling at a time like this? Did she not understand what I was saying to her?

“You’re that desperate to keep me from turning?” she frowned. Oh, she understood me. She just didn’t believe me. “You can’t change my mind. I’ve made my decision, and the lies won’t help.”

“Shit, they’re not lies!” I grabbed her arm, trying to sit her up, but she wouldn’t budge. “I heard them!”

“When did you become best friends with the vampires?” she rolled her eyes.

“Behind the church! They were talking behind the church!” I ignored her statement, but she was doing the same to everything I said.

“Go back inside if you don’t wanna be here,” she said flatly. “If you don’t wanna turn, but you’re here, they will probably eat you instead.”

I stared at her. They really had her fooled. She wouldn’t believe me no matter what I said. Still, every part of my mind was screaming at me to save her. I had left her the night before and they had corrupted her. I couldn’t leave her again.

“Nessa, please,” I begged. “Just believe me.”

She didn’t even bother to reply anymore. She was staring out into the streets, clutching her knees to her chest.

I heard the sound of wind rushing somewhere in the distance, but it was short and high pitched, whooshing in uneven patterns. I quickly realized it wasn’t the wind. I spun around and saw the same black blurs from the day before beginning to approach us.

“Nessa,” I tried one more time, but her eyes snapped up at me, and they were cold. Dead already. Soulless.

“Leave. Turn. Or die. Up to you.”

I sighed at the same time that I turned on my heels to run to the front door of the church. Nessa was gone. There was nothing I could do about it.

My foot was leaping over the last stair of the steps leading up to the front door of the church when a black blur appeared in front of me, but wasn’t just a blur for long. It went still and formed the body of a woman. My hand tightened around the stake in my hand, but loosened immediately. I took one look at her face and was mesmerized by the beauty before me.

It was a beauty unlike anything I could describe. Her pale skin didn’t look sickly as I had pictured; it was a beautiful white that made me feel at peace and calm as I took in every inch of it that I could. Her eyes examined me, glittering blue bulbs bouncing around the features of my face. Her lips were puckered perfectly in the most alluring shade of red. Her hair was short and silky straight, standing out against her skin, loose and uneven layers touching the sides of her face. Was this a vampire? A creature that I feared? She was beautiful. It was impossible for something this beautiful to be dangerous…

She didn’t move, her eyes still scanning me, not in a menacing way, but a curious and bemused way, as I’m sure mine were. The more I stared at her beautiful white skin, the more I wanted to know how it felt. Hesitantly, I brought my hand in front of me, not wanting to do anything sudden. My hand made its way towards her face. One side of her lips tugged up into a smirk as my hand hung just inches away from her neck. I thought her skin would melt at my touch, like snow. I finally allowed my hand to rest at the crook of her neck and found her skin was like snow, but not melting. It was ice cold beneath my warm touch, yet compelling. I stepped forward, wanting to take in more of this beautiful woman before me. Not a creature. A woman.

Her smirk grew and she tilted her head, brushing the back of my hand with soft strands of her hair. I moved my hand further, scooting it to the back of her neck. She brought her hand up to my outstretched arm, lightly gripping onto my slightly bent elbow. Her cold touch sent pleasant shivers throughout my body.

She sighed, just slightly parting her lips to send a cold gust of breath onto my face. I shut my eyes at the feeling. It was while my eyes were shut for that one second that the beauty of the situation before me changed.

When I opened them again, she was gone. My hand still lay on the back of a cold neck, and a cold hand still gripped my elbow. The beautiful woman was gone. What was left before me was a monster. The once beautiful eyes that held me still due to being mesmerized, now had me stricken and frozen with fear. Rather than a natural oval shape, the top lid was arched sharply, and the whites of her eyes transformed to black. Her bright blue eyes were shaped into slits, no longer alluring. Her skin was not a peaceful shade of white; it was pasty and sickening enough to make me nauseous. Lastly, her lips. They were still blood red, but now they were apart, and razor sharp white fangs greeted me. Before I could react, those teeth pierced the skin on my forearm, just below the bend of my elbow.

A violent rush was sent through me as she clamped her mouth across the spot she was biting. I couldn’t explain this feeling. I could feel the rough suction the pulled the blood out of my body, and simultaneously feel something replacing the blood that was taken. Something cold.

I pulled myself out of my thoughts and snatched my arm out of her mouth, causing an even bigger scar to appear when her sharp teeth scraped against the surface of my still untouched skin. Without waiting, without thinking, I took the stake and jammed it into her chest, only guessing if my aim was correct and I hit the heart. The girl gasped, sounding more animal like than anything else. I pushed her body down the stairs with my good arm and watched as she fell to the bottom, dark—almost black—blood slowly oozing out of her chest and onto the ground beneath her.

When she had stood in front of me in her beauty, everything had seemed to vanish. I didn’t know where I was, what was going on, all I saw was her. Now that she was away from me, I could hear Nessa’s loud and violent screams.

She was surrounded by vampires, two of them in the middle, holding her up by her arms against the church wall.

I attempted to walk down the stairs, but my vision suddenly blurred and my body met with the concrete steps below me and I lay there, feeling completely crippled, watching as Nessa screamed and yelled, knowing nothing could save her.

This feeling. This weakness. It was unusual. I couldn’t think what it was until I saw the bite marks left by the vampire. I was turning…

“No,” I croaked, watching the blood slowly trickle out of the fresh bite on my arm, but my attention was brought back to Nessa when I heard another blood curdling scream.

“DAVID!” I watched through blurred vision as the first bite was made into her neck. My eyes were on her and my mind was on the burning in my arm that was slowly and painfully making its way through the rest of my arm.

“Help me,” I whispered. My voice was completely inaudible compared to Nessa’s loud yelps.

“HELP ME!!!” Another bite onto the other side of her neck.

“Save me,” I croaked again. My entire arm was burning now, seething, and I felt the pain spread onto my shoulder, creeping towards my chest.

“NO!!” Another vampire joined, taking a spot on her arm into his mouth.

“Kill me,” I muttered, unable to even scream in pain when the burning reached my heart, and my chest singed with every flaming beat.

“STOP!!” Another joined. And another. And another. Until every vampire in the group surrounding her had his mouth latched onto a piece of her. There were no longer words coming out of her mouth. Just sounds. Screams that no longer sounded like screams. Cries that no longer sounded like cries. Sounds that no longer sounded human.

Blood spattered all around her, landing onto the pale skin of the animals surrounding her. I could no longer see her. Just hear her.

“Stake me,” I begged, crawling towards the door of the church.
Nessa’s yells were completely gone by now. All I could hear was the spilling of her blood. The tearing of her flesh. The lip and tongue smacking of her feeders. She was dead. I envied her.

The burning venom had covered the top half of my body and I wished more than anything that I could scream in pain, but the burning in my throat kept my voice lodged in my throat. Only small, pathetic croaks could make their way past my lips.

I used my legs to push me towards the front door. The venom was lingering around my hips. I had to hurry before it took me over completely.

“Stake me…please,” I begged no one at all. My eyes were shut and I continued forward. The stakes were not that far. Not that far. Within reach. I just had to crawl and there would be a stash of them near the door, on the floor, waiting for me.

The door felt a mile away when the venom spread quickly down my legs, burning every limb and every joint. Any movement resulted in a fire shooting through my entire body.

“Fuck,” I sighed, dropping my head onto the cement. Dropping my entire body. “Someone please save my soul.”

There was no hope. Nessa told me before that it was possible to fight off one bite. How was that possible with the mind numbing pain that it made me feel? The venom had spread through me. I was turning. This burning, this pain, had beat me. Sweat was dripping from every inch of my body, coating the floor beneath me.

“Please,” I begged once more, knowing there was no hope, but still hoping.

With the pain, with the burning, the scorching of every inch of my body, I thought of my mother and brother. What they felt. They felt the turn, they felt this. Their bodies lay behind the church, buried, while I would continue living, a soulless creature like the ones that had killed them. Would I hold any of my memories? Was there a chance my soul could survive?

There was no hope for that either. I already wanted to join the vampires ravishing on Nessa’s body. I craved her blood. The thought of it made my mouth water. Even with the burning pain, I wanted to make my way over, and lick up any of what was remaining. My salivating mouth yearned for it.

“No,” I cried, tears finally bursting out of my eyes. They ran a cold trail down my burning cheeks. I was craving Nessa’s blood. I was gone. “Kill me.”

One last useless beg. Before I was gone. Before my eyes shut and I left my soul behind.

**

My eyes opened slowly, only for me to squeeze them shut tight, blinded by the brightness of the white walls around me. I attempted to lift my arm to shield my face, but felt a searing pain shoot through my entire arm before I could even lift it. The rest of my body felt fine. Had I survived? Was I still human? The throbbing in my arm answered me by turning into a burn just below my elbow. The venom.

“Get it out!” I yelled, flinging my eyes open, ignoring the whiteness of the room around me that made my eyes sting and vision blur. “Someone pump the venom out! Please!”

“Shane?!” I heard a voice call my name. I couldn’t be bothered to think about who it was. I had to get it out before I turned.

“Please, hurry!” I begged whoever was calling me. “Get it out of me!”

“Shane!” the voice spoke again, beginning to sound familiar. “You’re awake. You’re okay, Shane. Please, calm down.”

That voice. It was my brother’s. I used my other arm that wasn’t burning with pain to rub my eyes so that my vision cleared. There was an IV in that arm and Nate stood next to the bed I was laying on, his eyes wide with panic. His head was unshaved and coated with his curly and treasured hair.

“Nate?” I whispered, suddenly voiceless with shock. “How…you’re alive?”

“I need to call the doctor,” Nate said, ignoring my question. “Where’s that damn button?” He looked around the buttons on the bed, until he saw a red one and pressed it. A woman’s voice answered, said something to him, he said something back, but I was no longer paying attention. My brother stood before me. Alive. Human. How was that possible? I had buried his body.

“Nate,” I spoke again. “How are you alive?”

“Why the fuck would I not be?” he said, rolling his eyes. The panic in his face was gone, replaced by the sarcastic Nate that I loved. “I know you wished I was dead and all, but damn.”

“Shut up!” I retorted a little too loudly, because his eye brows furrowed and he stared at me questioningly. “Don’t say shit like that.”

“Shane, do you remember what happened?”

Nessa had asked me that before, but at that time my answer was no. This time I nodded my head.

“Where’s Nessa?” I asked.

“Huh?”

“Nessa,” I said again. “She’s dead, isn’t she?”

“I don’t know a Nessa,” Nate said slowly, looking concerned again.

“Yes, you do. Nate, you knew her. I couldn’t remember, but she said we all knew each other. I just don’t understand how you’re alive, though. They got her. They almost got me. I thought…but I’m alive.”

“Shane, did you lose your fucking mind while you slept? You don’t really remember what happened, do you?”

“I do,” I insisted. “The vampires came out. They got Nessa. They only got a bite on me. I thought I had lost to it but I guess I didn’t. But, Nate, seriously, tell me how the fuck you’re alive? And Mom, shit, is Mom alive, too??”

“Shane, dude, seriously,” Nate shook his head, “you are kidding, right? It was just a dream or some shit and you’re fucking with me, right?”

I stared at my brother, never having seen him this serious before. I didn’t know what to make of what was going on. He was alive, clearly, but he knew nothing of the vampires. Of Nessa. If the vampires didn’t leave the burning puncture in my bandaged arm, what did?

“I don't…” I mumbled. “I don’t remember what happened.”

“You and your fucking drugs, man,” Nate said, trying to keep the disgust out of his tone. “You shot some heroin, you dumb ass, but I don’t know where the hell you got that shit ‘cause you got an infection. On top of that, you drank some pills—I don’t even wanna know what the fuck the pills were, I didn’t ask—with whiskey. You’re a fucking idiot, you know that? You’re so lucky you’re still alive. You’ve been knocked out for four days now.”

“Asleep?” I mumbled. Nate nodded. “This whole time?” Nate nodded again.

No, it couldn’t have been. Was all that a dream? No, I refused to believe that. All of it was too real. Everything felt so real. The pain, the sorrow, the grief, the guilt, the craving for blood. All of it felt too authentic to be just a dream. No. And I wasn’t going insane either. It was just impossible. Or was it? Had I been right to question Nessa when she first wanted to tell me about the vampires? But wait…Nessa didn’t exist either.

My thoughts ran through my head like a drum, causing a severe headache to strike suddenly. I groaned in pain, wanting the confusion to stop. There was now a thin line between reality and my dreams. I couldn’t see the difference anymore.

“Shane, you alright?” Nate asked, but I didn’t answer him. I shut my eyes to drown out the pain, but was soon followed by empty blackness. No sound. No feeling. I wasn’t dead. I wasn’t sleeping. It was a peaceful in between of nothingness.

I found my consciousness coming back to me and I groaned out loud, wanting to stay in that state forever. The groan had actually come out of my mouth. So I was awake. I became aware of my body, still in the same bed, the IV still in one arm, and the bandage on the other. Though every part of me wanted to enjoy more thoughtless moments, I knew I had to wake up. I couldn’t be asleep for another four days. This time I may dream up a zombie apocalypse—the right kind of apocalypse.

I opened my eyes, welcomed by the same bright white room. I squinted my eyes, searching for my brother, but instead saw a nurse with her back to me.

“Excuse me?” I whispered, my voice still groggy and hoarse with sleep. The nurse didn’t turn. I cleared my throat and spoke louder. “Excuse me, nurse? Where’s my brother?” She still didn’t answer me. I knew I wasn’t that quiet. “Nurse?”

“Mhm?” she finally answered, her back still turned to me.

“Uh, where is my brother?” I asked again.

“Gone,” she answered simply. That word sent shivers down my spine. Gone, as in to get food or something? The vampire dream went rushing through my head again, but I quickly shook the thought away.

“Gone where?” I croaked, not ready to face the thought of him dying again. I thought I had him back. The nurse was silent again and panic struck every part of me. “Gone where? Where did he go?? Answer me! What do you mean gone?!”

“Shhhh,” she spoke again, this time turning to face me. My entire body went numb with the sight of her. Beautiful white skin. Blood red lips. Piercing blue eyes. The vampire that had bit me. Before I could squirm in my bed in a failed attempt to get away, she was at my bedside, pressing her hand against my bandaged arm. I yelled as the familiar burning of venom coursing through every part of my body came back at full force. Everything burned as she continued to press tighter and tighter. Her beauty quickly faded as it had before, the ugliness of her true, vampire-self showing clearly.

“No!” I cried, barely choking the word out.

“Shhhh,” she said again, this time allowing a smile to spread across her face, proudly flaunting the fangs that had been well acquainted with my blood earlier. The pain had doubled over and I felt myself slipping out of consciousness again. My vision faded, but the burning of my body continued. “Everything is okay, David. Your soul is safe.”