A Vampire's Rotten Heart

Ant Ripper

    They were persistent, but I was, too.

    No matter how much they pulled and tore, I held onto my neck. Even once my finger bones were exposed to the open air. This wouldn't kill me. None of this would.

   I couldn't die by the hands of my own kind. Even if I was drowning in a pool of my own blood.

    They were satisfied. I was a mangled mess. The ground had thoroughly soaked up my blood.

    And just like that, they were back in their perfectly straight, orderly lines like nothing happened.

    For once, I was glad I couldn't see down here. I had lost all sensation in my hands and wings. I didn't want to see how mangled they were.

I raised my arm and fumbled my hand to my neck.

Yep. That was bone.

My insides folded in on themselves. I wanted to lie here and hope someone else would find me. I wanted to sleep through the pain.

Was this worth it? I knew where the exit was. I could just crawl back.

But who would help me? I wasn't wanted on the surface, and I wasn't wanted here.

And besides. I couldn't leave Lady Angeltwice. But could I even get up?

    Perhaps what disturbed me the most was how anyone could do this. How multiple people could do this.

    In the past, they could've been normal people. And if things had gone differently, I could've been one of them.

I planted my feet into the ground and rose up, shaking. Violently.

There was barely any me left.

I needed that tree. I never did before. But I did now. Where was he? Why wasn't he here?

Step by step, I shambled foreword, nearly collapsing under my own weight with every shift.

Lord, please save me.

But I had to be the one doing the saving.

    I put my hand to the ground and dragged myself foreword. I was trampled over and over again by workers. But if the supervisor could survive being decapitated, I could survive this.

    I wondered how he was doing.

——————————————————

    I felt like I had been crawling for days. Perhaps I was. There was no way to tell time down here.

    But when all was hopeless, a familiar voice came crying from the darkness.

    "Oh! Garrett! There you are!"

    I looked up from the floor. The tunnel was lit by torches, and the walls were struck with iron bars.

    But these "new" Noxies didn't seem interested in using the prison cells so graciously made by those that came before them. Instead, they dug their own crude craters, interspersed between the cells, sometimes bleeding into them.

    Angeltwice was held in one of these craters, cuffed behind her back and chained to a wall. On either side were two winged guards, their silhouettes illuminated by torches, their bodies still as statues and cold as stone.

    But she didn't look concerned.

    "I've been waiting for you for so long! I've been trying to ask these two why they have wings if they live underground, but they aren't terribly responsive."

    I almost buried myself right then and there.

    "Well, you don't look in good shape."

    No shit.

    "Help a lady out?"

    Like I had the energy to take on two full vampires. I planted my face in the dirt.

    "Garrett, these vampires aren't very bright. You were right about them being like ants. Dumb as individuals, but smart as a colony."

    I groaned. Here she went again.

    "Why aren't you like that?"

    I mustered up enough energy to respond.

    "They weren't like this last time. This is new."

    "Were they... cursed?"

    "Conquered." Another voice I recognized.

    I turned my head around to catch a glimpse of a disembodied corpse. Still in a human cell. Forgotten.

    "I've had the pleasure of learning all the details during my time here," he said, "And I can't tell you why they're like this, either. They just... showed up and ravaged us. No warning. No formal declaration of war. They came and slaughtered as they saw fit."

    Of course Angeltwice had the biggest grin on her face.

    "They're dumb as posts," he continued, "but they're efficient. So efficient."

Angeltwice looked like she was about to scream with excitement, but for now, she contained her energy by furiously scribbling in her notebook.

"They look like us, but they aren't us."

The lady was muttering something under her breath. Something I couldn't quite understand.

"I've been trying to escape, but—" The supervisor slipped one of his severed arms though the bars and had it climb up to the lock in an attempt to pick it, but the guards in front of Angeltwice rushed over to stab it back into place.

"They have an... interesting idea of a kingdom." The supervisor took his arm and tended to it. "My lord, I don't care what you do with yourself now. We're all but extinct. Go ahead and let yourself burst. Give the old Noxies a chance."

My face went right back into the dirt. "Could you do that thing with your arm again?"

"What? Why?"

"You're not supposed to question me."

Soon enough, the guards came rushing back over.

"Run, my lady, run!"