Dark & Familiar

Chapter 1: The Auction

They came for us at night, grabbed us from our beds. I didn't know what they were, only that their eyes glittered in the dark like opals. When I woke up it was to the sound of crying, and I was naked in a cage. There were at least a hundred of us. The scent was awful. The other terrified captives had relieved themselves like frightened animals.

No one spoke. They screamed in abject horror, shouted unintelligibly, or groaned. I would later learn that we had been compelled not to speak until permitted, and under their compulsion, which was a sort of magical hypnosis, our futile grunts and cries were the product of legitimate attempts to communicate and ask the important questions now relevant to our new circumstances. Such as...

Where am I?

Who am I?

Why am I here?

The answer to the first question was somewhat obvious, we were in a cage. Beyond that, none of us knew the answer. But we would find out more in time. The second question became more strange the longer I considered it.

Who am I? How do I not know who I am?

Later I would learn that our minds had been erased by compulsion during capture. They told me that it made the transition easier if we had no memories.

The third question, Why am I here?

Well-- we were about to find out.

A spotlight flipped on and we all shielded our eyes. Then one by one we were led out onto a large stage. In front of us was an audience. Every member of the audience wore a mask. Some were ornate, others Victorian. Others wore half-masks that covered only the tops of their faces and their eyes, leaving their mouths visible. I could see they were smiling, and I could also see they had fangs.

A man's voice was heard, presumably the organizer for the show. He spoke in a language I could not understand. It was elegant, sophisticated, and vain. It was as beautiful as it was mysterious. While I could not make out a word, I understood what was happening by the cadence and patter of his speech. It was that of an auctioneer.

As he spoke, a masked associate would grab one of us from the cage, and the auction would begin. The audience would raise paddles with numbers on them, back and forth, members bid up our value like we were nothing more than cattle. Until finally paddles would stop, and the last one to raise their paddle, whoever bid the most, would be declared the winner. The sold property, a fellow human like myself, would be escorted to the side, and exit the stage, disappearing into the black behind the red curtain.

Then the next human was led out onto the stage, and the auction would begin again. I watched many humans disappear in this fashion. Dozens vanished with all the ceremony of a used car sold for spare parts. But occasionally, a human would go up for auction and no paddles would rise. After a few moments, if there were no bids, and none of the audience showed interest, something different would happen.

A redheaded girl, perhaps sixteen, stumbled onto the stage, covering her chest and groin from the audience. Their fanged smiles disappeared, and they snarled as if they had seen something quite distasteful. After a few seconds, when it became clear that no paddles would be raised, a gold spike shot up from the floor and skewered her body in an instant. But it didn't kill her, not right away.

The spike missed her heart and head, stabbing through her left leg, arm, and part of her torso. She would die, but it would take several gruesome seconds as her blood drained from her slowly, and it fed into grooves in the floor that dispensed her vital essence by tubes to glasses stationed at the arms of the audience for consumption.

A few of the audience members sniffed the glass of red essence before setting it back down while others sipped at it politely. But most did not bother feigning interest.

To this day, I do not know what it was about the redhead that they found so distasteful. But the question has haunted me for many years. The answer I have come to believe is even more troubling. I believe that there was nothing wrong with the redhead, or her blood. I suspect that they rejected her and killed her simply because they could.

As much as the proposition of becoming a human kebab troubled me, I was equally disturbed when I realized that I didn't know if being bought would be any better. I didn't know where they were taking the humans that were sold. It was possible, I realized, that whatever fate awaited them might be worse than death.

But I didn't let that train of thought go on too long. Instead, I clung to the hope of escape and resolved myself to survive, and the only way I was going to do that was by raising paddles. I had to attract interest from the audience. I had to be sold to a vampire.