The good times don't last... then again, you guys know my stories always come with some sort of drama to resolve.
Chapter Warnings: Blood (and marrow)
***
Palette closed the door to his house, fixing his beige scarf as he dashed toward the woods.
He had been meeting Goth over the course of a week, and he loved having someone to goof around with. The young vampire seemed to enjoy the company as well, claiming he didn't have many friends himself, vampire or otherwise.
Palette lived by himself, so as long as he came back with something at the end of the day, such as wood or food, his neighbors never questioned his absence.
Goth mentioned something about a lake yesterday, I wonder if he's planning on showing it to me today. We could go fishing! Or maybe we can play tag again, or-
"AH!"
A cry in the distance cut his planning short, prompting him to run toward the source of the sound. The voice was dreadfully familiar...
Please let me be wrong.
The sound of faint laughter could be heard followed by another cry of pain. He urged himself to move faster.
That definitely sounded like Goth... he sounds hurt!
"What's this?" a gruff male voice said.
"G... giveitback!" Goth cried, his words breathy and strained as if they were being forced through a narrow tube.
"Oh my god, is that-?!"
Palette's emergence from the brush interrupted the exclamation as everyone present turned to look at him.
A group of men surrounded Goth, who was laying on his stomach with a long, thin object sticking out of his left shoulder blade. He was trembling, his breath coming in halting gasps as he sent Palette a fearful look through watery sockets.
Palette recognized most of the men as his fellow neighbors, a well-known hunting group in his village. The man that had been yelling, Chad, had an open leather pouch in his hand.
"Hey Roller, you're just in time to join the fun," one of the skinnier men, Lyle, chortled, walking over to wrap a thin arm around him, "we found ourselves one-a them vampire freaks!"
"Lucky us, silver does work on hellspawn, so it's not going anywhere. Good thing Davies brought along his silver-tipped arrows," a stockier man, Wesker, interjected as he wiggled the arrow protruding from the vampire's shoulder.
The group laughed as the movement elicited a pained whimper through gritted teeth and more tears from the small vampire.
"Leave Goth alone!" Palette shouted, wrenching himself from Lyle's grip.
"Goth...? Wait, you know this freak?" Chad questioned, looking between the two skeletons, "Don't tell me this is where you've been going for the past week... did you know he's a vampire? You know they just mess with you so they can suck you dry, right?"
Palette clenched his fists as he retorted, "No, he's not like that! He wouldn't-"
"Enough!" Chad bellowed, throwing the pouch on the ground and slamming his boot down upon it. Goth let out a strangled gasp as the contents shattered and spilled beneath the hunter's foot.
The man ignored his victim's lament as he declared, "You're clearly being manipulated and brainwashed by this vampire... and as good samaritans, we need to do something about that."
A shriek tore through the air as Wesker violently ripped the arrow from Goth's shoulder blade. The men watched dispassionately as he descended into raspy sobs and a deep red splotch dyed the back of his cloak, his marrow spreading rapidly from the open wound.
"Stop it! Stop hurting him, he didn't do anything wrong!" Palette screamed as Lyle held him back.
"It exists... that's enough," Chad said, a cruel sneer adorning his face.
The cloaked skeleton struggled to crawl away from his aggressors, only to choke on air as Chad's foot roughly pinned him into the grass, "As fun as all this is, it's getting late. We should wrap this up."
He pulled out a serrated hunting knife, crouching lower while still pinning Goth's back under his boot, "Any last words, hellspawn?"
The smaller gasped out, eye sockets clenched tightly, "P... pal...ette... g... go..."
"The only place you're going is to hell where you belong," Chad growled, raising the knife to strike at his hooded skull.
"GOTH!" Palette howled as he finally pulled out of Lyle's grip, scrambling to stop the attack.
I won't be able to make it in time!
A rush of air overtook the clearing as Chad lost his balance, falling over as the target of his blade suddenly vanishing from under him.
...though Palette was able to catch sight of a ball of white and red contrasting the trees and grass as the wind died down. He raced forward while the rest of the group tried to get their bearings.
"What the... the vampire changed! Someone grab it!" Chad shouted, pointing toward Goth's retreating bat form.
He was a fair distance away already but was clearly impeded by his injury, unable to even fly properly as he stuttered along the ground, desperately using his right wing in an attempt to gain some altitude.
Palette managed to beat them to the punch, plucking the creature from the grass before anyone else could react. Pulling his squirming friend to his chest, the monster made a break for the treeline.
He heard the sound of metal embedding itself into the wood of a tree as he kept running, Wesker yelling behind him, "They're getting away, catch them!"
Palette ignored their shouts, more concerned with the screeching, bleeding ball of fur fighting his hold. "Goth... Goth, it's okay! It's me, it's Palette! Please, calm down, you're going to hurt yourself more if you struggle!" he pleaded as he continued weaving through the trees.
The white bat stilled in his grasp. Palette glanced down to see a pair of eyes tiredly staring up at him in confusion. The skeleton grimaced at the bat's haggard appearance.
The fur on Goth's back was matted with blood and the wound showed no signs of stopping soon. Palette could feel his tiny body shivering, his rapidly pulsing soul beats thrumming against the skeleton's bloodstained fingers.
Goth needs blood to heal, but those jerks broke his blood vials. I promised I'd never ask or force him to bite, so he would probably fight me if I tried... he doesn't look like he can afford to waste the energy.
Palette pressed his fingers gently against the injury, hoping to stem the flow as he murmured to himself, "There has to be something, think... no biting... no vials... oh!"
He nearly tripped as an idea came to him. Forcing himself to speak slowly and clearly, he asked, "It doesn't have to be a vial, right? Can you take blood if it's in a cup or another container?"
Goth chirped weakly, dipping his head to rest against Palette's chest. "I'll take that as a yes...," he murmured gravely, hastening his pace at the unenthused response.
Not good... he's losing too much blood and becoming lethargic. Hang on a little bit longer, Goth. I promise I'll help you.
***
Oops... they broke the Goth...
Word Count: 1,154