Scars from the Past

AN: This is a Harborview Immortals Extra prequel short story that focuses on one of the main characters, the vampire Jacob. It will contain some references to Family Matters and the series proper but isn't explicitly required to read this.

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Scars from the Past

A Harborview Immortals Story

Written by Emma Peterson

Copyright 2022 by Emma Peterson/CLI

Cover image courtesy of Unsplash Free Images

This story is a work of fiction. References to real people, places, or historical events are used fictitiously. All other characters, names, events, places, and so on are strictly products of the author's crazed imagination. Any resemblance to actual places, events, or persons-living, dead, or zombie-is completely coincidental.

This story contains mild adult content.

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August 2000

Jacob didn't understand why so many of his fellow centuries-old vampires hated airplanes. While it was true that they had lived during a time when the idea of large objects flying high in the sky would have seemed impossible and terrifying, he thought it utterly silly to harbor such dread when they were now perfectly capable of flying high in the sky themselves. At least with a plane, one could reach their destination in a timely manner and without an overabundance of exertion.

He looked out of the window. While his eyes took in the darkness of a clear night sky, his thoughts were on the family he had left behind, and an unexpected snort of laughter escaped him as he reflected on events from earlier that evening. Xan had spent a number of hours following up his usual random acts of endearing silliness with bold and repeated proclamations that he had only been "taking a piss," and it had taken a long and awkward minute to deduce that the eight-year-old had apparently misunderstood the phrase "taking the piss" from their beloved British vampire friend Becky. Dominic's legendary stoic demeanor had no chance against the hilariousness of the situation and even he had let slip a brief chuckle while Jacob had laughed so hard that he came close to crying.

It had only been an hour since he kissed them both goodbye, but he missed them fiercely and was already counting down the days until he saw them again.

His smile gradually faded as his mind turned to the plane's destination. Returning to Georgia was not something he had planned to do anytime soon-or ever again, if he could help it-and the closer he got, the more those little pinpricks of trepidation in his chest that he hadn't been able to ignore started to feel like outright stabs. Soon, he would be in the presence of the son of his former owner... who also happened to be the man he had once loved... who also happened to be the vampire who had killed and turned him against his will.

The last time Jacob saw James had not ended well, to say the least, and it had taken an astronomical display of Dominic's dark power to finally convince him to stand down and leave Jacob alone. Now he was going back without the safety net of his lover's protection, a fact that understandably worried Dominic. But the James he would soon be facing was no longer the James of old, a tormented soul who had done unspeakable things in response to an act of cruelty he had been forced to commit in order to save the life of the one he loved. Jacob knew that he hadn't been the only victim that awful night. While his physical scars were only skin-deep, James' emotional scars had run right down to the center of his being, corrupting everything that Jacob had loved about him until only madness remained.