Give Me Envy, Give Me Malice, Give Me Your Attention

So many horrified screams echoed that the lips they were issued from were unidentifiable. All except one pair of painted lips fixed in severe agony at the scene before their kinsmen blue irises.

Regardless of everything else, completely numb to it all, Lara collapsed to the floor, her dress ripping slightly at the side, and crawled over to the wheezing figure of her fiancé; her should-be-husband.

“No,” she whispered to him, shaking her head. “No… you won’t leave me. You won’t.”

Andy smiled weakly but couldn’t reply. His calloused hand reached out to stroke Lara’s pale cheek as her warm tears fell upon his clean-shaven face, but it was clear that he didn’t have much life left in him.

“Fuck you, William!”

Bella’s scream was so loud, so shrieking, so ear-splitting and so unbelievably unlike her that everything, even the skies seemed to hide behind the silence. Her face was twisted in a mixture of negativity, all aimed with perfect precision at William. Although still beautiful in human eyes, she had never looked more dangerous. She looked like a murderous, bloodthirsty vampire from children’s worst nightmares.

William Beckett’s face, in sharp comparison, had softened back to human. His brown eyes were widened in shock at himself, appalled at what he’d just done. Yet at the same time, the vampire in him danced just behind the surface, easily within reach.

“Bella…” he murmured.

“No!” she screamed. “Shut up! Don’t fucking talk to me, or try to touch me or anyone I care about ever again! I don’t know how I ever loved you!”

With the snarl still fixed in place, Bella took hold of the silver key necklace she wore around her neck. It was made of white gold and encrusted with diamonds; an extravagant gift that he’d given to her when he first started courting her. Her strong fingers wrapped around it and tugged hard, the jewelry breaking at the back and falling from her neck, still pressed into her palm.

“B…”

“I said fucking shut up Beckett!”

With all the strength in her, Bella threw the necklace at his feet. Almost immediately, his eyes flashed red and the vampire was back, turning to glare at Anna. It’s all her fault…

That was when all chaos broke loose. As brave beings flung themselves around the clearing, Lara couldn’t get her response. Humans, taking one last leap of heroism, began trying to fight the vampires, as the immortals toned down their techniques just for the entertainment and fought back. Wooden stakes and chairs flew, pausing for a moment against the murky gray background of the overcast sky before being snatched by gravity and falling back to the earth to inanimately participate in the flurry of a fight. Some of the Dandies had turned, decided to fight against Beckett’s crowd instead of for. Michael and Travis were the two primary examples.

Adam Siska had managed to break free of his brother, diving to the ground where his old friend bled openly.

“Butcher…” he said hopelessly, sound lost in the midst of all the noise.

Lara wasn’t blinking. She didn’t look up at the seemingly sympathetic vampire also crying over her lover. She was just broken. Nothing mattered, until the strange vampire across from her yelled at her, bringing her crashing back into the fray.

“Look out!”

She spun around just in time to avoid a muscled vampire with bared fangs. She quickly pulled out the dagger-shaped stake she’d stashed on her leg and plunged it deep into the vampire’s shoulder, enjoying the sound of his cry before pulling it out and stabbing him in the heart. Her dagger was spent, splintering and blunt, so she grabbed a broken wooden chair leg off the ground and stood up, looking around with a grave face for her next victim. She didn’t expect to get out of this alive. She didn’t want to get out alive, not if Andy was dead. But hell if she wasn’t going out without a fight.

Jon had come to Ryan’s assistance, apologizing to his other two friends before fighting them off. He may not have been a vampire, but he had always had the strongest figure out of all of them and they didn’t notice him creeping up from behind them. It took plenty of effort, but eventually he and Ryan had knocked Spencer and Brendon out.

“Thanks man,” Ryan said, panting slightly more out of instinct than anything else.

“No problem,” Jon gave a wavering grin, but it quickly faltered as his eyes widened at something behind Ryan, who spun to see what was happening.

William Beckett was so much more than just angry. He was furious, incensed, fuming, enraged, and certainly mad. His evil red eyes were fixed on only one thing as he stormed forwards, as if none of the scrimmage was occurring around them. He wasted no time in hitting Anna again, almost smoking at the ears, and kicking her down.

“No more!” he thundered.

The fighting all around slowed considerably, all wanting to see what would happen.

“You,” he glared at her, hitting her again. “Have destroyed everything I am, everything I worked so hard for. You are nothing, and you don’t deserve to exist in their world or ours. You’re scum, and I’ve been far too lenient. But no longer. I’m sick of this stupidity. It ends here. Right now. I am your creator, and I shall be your destroyer. Arianna Thorn, this is your downfall. Would you care to greet it?”

After his extravagant speech, Anna couldn’t look up. Her eyes were drowned in tears, and she sat crunched up into herself, just waiting. Beckett grinned widely, exposing his bright white teeth so that all his spectators could see them as he elongated his canines. He had taken so much of her blood to begin with, and now he was going to finish the job. He was going to finish her off.

He quickly swooped down to her body, running a hand along her back that he knew would make her arch towards him, because even after all this she still wanted him. He smiled at how easy this all seemed in these moments, as her neck stretched out to reveal the hasty puncture marks he’d created so long ago.

Just before he could lean in and finish what he started, his exceptional hearing picked up on footsteps running behind him. He sighed inaudibly and spun around less than a second before Ryan could force the stake through his back.

“You didn’t really think it would be that easy, did you, Ross?”

He laughed manically as they stepped back and began to fight. Punches and weapons were thrown as they circled each other. Ryan was a good fighter; William had underestimated him. Beckett needed to concentrate harder than he usually would have. But he had confidence in himself. He was the William Beckett. No one trembled at the name of Ryan Ross. He should pose as no threat. No one should. And it was with this confidence that Ryan was tossed to the floor; knocked out or dead, William wasn’t sure. It didn’t matter. His eyes were shut, and there was nothing he could do.

William made his way back to Anna’s now trembling body, holding her sharply and positioning his mouth over her neck. Check mate.

Just as his lips closed around the flawless skin, William felt an extraordinary sensation through his body. Pain, pleasure, shock, realization all combined into a physical feeling erupting from a jagged, paralyzing pain in his chest. He gasped, for he had never felt pain like this before. He dropped Anna’s body like a rag doll and looked down to where a bloody fragment of wood stuck out from his chest.

His heart had been pierced.

He coughed and spluttered, his eyes returning to brown and his features all returning to the way they once had been, back when he was human. He didn’t get a chance to do anything before he fell to the ground, twitching and writhing before disappearing to dust.

Ryan Ross now stood in his place, tiredly watching the great William Beckett, leader of the renowned Dandy clan, disintegrate before him.