Blood & Grunge: A Vermillion Strain Story

Chapter 24

These bizarre trains of thought that hijacked her best memories weren't limited to her brother. She thought of her mother and the way they both doubled over with laughter during the family vacations they used to take. The veins in her mother's neck would pop out, so intense was her laughter. Miranda found herself contemplating just how much blood must have been filling them to make them pop up like that. Her mind was one-track when it came to Scott, too. As much as she wanted to think about the times she'd fallen asleep listening to his heartbeat, it would never stay there. It always descended into madness. His heartbeat meant several pints of fresh blood were surging through him each and every second. Surely he didn't need all of it. Surely he could share it. He shared other fluids with her, so why couldn't he give her his blood? Before he'd gotten that glorious neck tattoo there had been a green spot on the side of his throat, his jugular vein teasing with a small appearance through his skin. It would have felt so good in her mouth. These thoughts raged on and on, and she swayed between fear and torment and glee and pleasure as they invaded her mind.    

 As time wore on there were thumping sounds above her, as if someone was scraping or stomping on the earth. Whoever it was, they never spoke. She was sure it was neither Scott nor Lane. It wasn't anyone she knew. One day, the dirt felt lighter. By now, hunger was the only thing on her mind. Every living thing that entered her mind left with a huge hole in its neck and blood spurting into her mouth so hard that it shot down the back of her throat. These thoughts were interrupted by a thumping heart and a voice that she could hardly hear over the loud pounding. She pushed up the way she always did, seeing if she could get any further than she had the last time.  

"Who the hell is digging at the grave like this?" the voice asked. "Wait, are those paw prints?" 

She heard no more, too overcome with joy to concentrate on anything else. She could stand now!  Last time, all she could do was kneel and her hands couldn't reach the top. Now, a slight breeze tickled her fingertips when she reached out. The sensation triggered frenzy. That heart continued thudding, the blood swooshed around back and forth through the veins connected to it. She was mobile now and blood was so close. All she had to do was get out of here. She waved her arms around with strength she didn't know she had until she could touch her fingers to solid earth. She touched the area on the edge of the hole she had been put in. She jumped slightly and was able to use her arms to propel herself forward.  

She landed on something solid. She didn't notice its screams or its shouts of her name. All she noticed was how fast its heart was pumping and how full of blood it was. Lights flashed through her eyes as she chomped into it. The sensation was the lovechild of an orgasm and biting into a delicious, well-seasoned veggie burger. Hot, sweet-smelling blood surged forth into her mouth and she drank at the pace of the heart. She drew back as the beat slowed. It wasn't so satisfying now that the heartbeat was waning. She fell onto the ground and wondered why she wasn't panting. She closed her eyes and smiled as she felt that sweet, hot nectar flow through her body. It was like sleep after a long day, good sex after a bout of abstinence, a hug from someone you loved, or ice cold lemonade on a hot day. And then some.  

Croaking brought Miranda out of her ecstasy. She leaned over, her mind flooding with horror at just what this 'it' she had sucked the blood from was. It wasn't an 'it' at all, how could she think of a human being as an 'it'? And 'it' wasn't just any human being. It was the one she came into this world with 18 years ago. Lane looked up at her with an expression of pure terror. It broke her heart to think that she caused it. His eyes appeared rife with mistrust and betrayal. 

"Oh my God, Laney!" she shouted, reverting back to what she'd called him until they hit their teens. She reached out to touch him, but she sobbed as he flinched and jerked away from her. He looked even more horrified and averted his eyes from her face. Something salty yet metallic hit her lips. Blood. She was crying blood. No wonder he looked more frightened than before.  

"We'll fix this, okay?" she insisted. Lane convulsed as his blue eyes rolled into the back of his head. His heart rate slowed, to say nothing of the gaping wound she'd left in him. She'd torn open the skin from his clavicle and down towards his shoulder, leaving a mess of shredded muscle and white bone. The wound oozed with crimson blood and yellow liquid that she somehow knew was fat. Still, she could fix this. She had to. She closed her eyes and thought of her last memory before she wound up in the box. That man, that evil, treacherous, sickening man, held his bleeding arm over her face and dripped blood into her mouth. Maybe that was why she survived? Various cultures had legends and stories regarding the power of blood. Perhaps it was true? Even if it wasn't, she had to try. She bit into her own wrist with unparalleled speed and forced Lane's head up before holding her bleeding wrist over his mouth. She held it there until the blood spilled forth from his mouth and dribbled down the sides of his now paper white face. His heart was silent.  

Miranda's face twisted at what she'd done. Her brother was dead. Her twin brother was dead, and she had killed him. As distraught as she was, her crying stopped with the suddenness of a car crash. Her stormy sea of thoughts calmed, enabling her to consider something beyond the fact that her other half was now gone forever. She had risen from her grave and now hovered over her brother's corpse. This would confuse and traumatize the hell out of whoever saw it. Considering who visited her grave, it could be her parents, Scott, Phoebe, Phoebe's parents, and any and every one she cared about. She couldn't do this to them. She had to get herself and Lane away from this horribly public place. She would eventually have to put him somewhere he could be found. She didn't want her parents spending a lifetime thinking he'd gone missing and aching for closure, but she had to clean him up first. She couldn't let them see him like this. She pulled him up, cringing at the notion of dragging him into the woods like trash all because she was too weak to carry him. She pulled him to her, gasping at how light his body was. She tried carrying him on a whim, only to find she could hold him like an infant with very little stress or strain.  

She ventured far enough into the woods to keep her racing thoughts at bay. She needed time to think. Several ideas crossed her mind, some mediocre, but most of them bad, until a childhood memory sparked the best one possible. Images of an abandoned house, on the edge of town just past Andrea Wood Lane, flashed behind her eyes. She'd snuck into it with friends whenever they spent the night at Phoebe's old house, which was within walking distance from the empty, dilapidated home. It was a long way for someone presumed dead to walk. A car was her only option, but how the hell would she get one? The panic that threatened to overcome her washed away as she remembered the obvious: her brother must have come here in his car. She left him under some bushes, planting a light kiss on his cheek as she did so. Her lips left a streak of blood on his face.  "I'll be back Laney," she said as she took his keys. The jog to his car turned into a sprint at a pace she didn't know she was capable of.  

She drove to the hiding spot and gently loaded her brother into the back seat of the car. "I'm sorry," she said again, even though she knew he couldn't hear her. "We're going to go to that old house we used to play in and I'm going to spruce you up. You'll be back to your handsome self once again."  His glossy eyes stared back at her with no emotion. His arm fell limply off the side of the seat, as if to answer her with the reminder that it didn't matter what she did for him anymore. She'd taken everything that mattered when she killed him. Piercing sobs wracked her body, so desperate and howl-like that wolves began to approach the car. It was hours before she could work up the fortitude to drive to her destination.