Bloodsucker
By Littlesilverstar, silverstar222b@yahoo.com
A simple legal case turns into a terrifying vampire adventure for a young woman


Krista Winter sat in her small office at the law firm of Merrell, Rothstein,
and Hogarth, gazing longingly out the window at the blue sky. It was one of
those November days in Dallas when it was still warm and sunny. She wished she
could be out on the golf course or the tennis court, but she still had a lot
of paperwork to wrap up from her last case.

Krista was 32 years old and, like most attorneys her age, fully engaged in the
shark-like battle to the top in her profession. She was currently a
"non-equity" partner at the firm, meaning that she was allowed to use the
title of partner, but didn't get a share of the firm's profits (or her name as
part of the firm's name) like the equity partners did. Still, she was doing
quite well. She was one of the youngest lawyers to make partner, even a
non-equity one, and though she didn't get to share in the firm's profits, her
promotion had come with a very nice raise. And she had her own office, unlike
the cubicles the junior attorneys were stuck with.

A knock on the door made her look up. Her boss, Mr. Hogarth, entered the
office. "Good morning, Krista. Just got in and heard the news. Congratulations
on your victory in the Jones case."

"Thank you." She smiled in her well-practiced, confident but not too cocky
manner.

"Ready for another one? This one may sound dull, but things could get a lot
more...interesting."

"Sure. Tell me more."

"Well, recently, one of our clients, an 83-year-old man named Anton Vonn,
passed away. He owned a large mansion in Maine, and in his will left it to his
only known living relative, his nephew, Darren Vonn. Unfortunately, Darren
seems to have disappeared from the face of the earth. He was living in Maine,
near his uncle, but vanished around the same time the old man died. We need
someone to go to Maine, find Darren Vonn, and straighten this whole thing out.
Merrell and Rothstein agreed that based on your recent work, you should have
first crack at it, if you want. Are you interested?"

Krista perked up. She enjoyed traveling, especially if it was on the firm's
dime, and loved a good mystery. "Sure. Sounds interesting already, actually."

"That's not even the most interesting part. There are rumors that the old man,
Anton Vonn, was, well..."

"Was what, sir?"

"That he's...well...a vampire. That when he was about to die, he performed
some crazy ritual, turned himself into a vampire, rose from the dead, and is
haunting the mansion." Mr. Hogarth, seeing the expression on Krista's face,
quickly said, "I know, I know."

"Is there any...evidence for these rumors?" she asked.

"Well, the old man's body disappeared from his coffin. And he was always very
eccentric, living alone in that creepy old mansion."

"Doesn't sound like very strong evidence to me. Some weirdos probably just
stole the corpse for God knows what."

"Probably. But at any rate, there's a missing body and a missing, presumably
living nephew. Still interested?"

"Absolutely. I may be a vampire skeptic but if there turned out to really be
something..."

"Great. How soon can you be ready to go? How are you coming along with the
Jones paperwork?"

Krista glanced briefly over her desk. "I can get it wrapped up today no
problem and be ready to go tomorrow. Should be a good flight, now that this
Covid crisis is finally over and we can travel without masks again."

"Yes. You don't have to tell me. Well, I'll have our travel assistant make the
arrangements." Hogarth handed her a file. "Here's all the information you'll
need about the new case. Good luck."

* * *

TWO DAYS LATER

Krista sat at the counter of the small-town Maine diner, going over the
information in the file one last time as she ate her sausage and eggs.

Yesterday had been a long day of traveling, flying from Dallas to
Philadelphia, changing planes, flying to Bangor, Maine, and renting a car for
the two-hour drive to this small town deep in the Maine woods. By the time she
had gotten there, the November sky was dark. The lumpy bed in the cheap motel,
the only one in town, hadn't been the best for her sleep schedule, and she
found herself thinking longingly of the elegant luxury hotels she'd stayed in
on trips to big cities. At least the firm had paid for first-class tickets for
her on the plane. And at least the breakfast was good. She finished her meal,
paid the check, leaving a generous tip for the waitress, and went to the
restroom to freshen up.

In the bathroom, she studied her reflection in the mirror. Krista was a very
attractive young woman, with long auburn hair, blue eyes, tanned skin, and an
elegant, high-cheekboned face. Long hours of soccer, ballet, and gymnastics
practice growing up, along with good genetics, had granted her a muscular but
feminine athlete's body (and a full soccer scholarship to a Division I
college). She carried all the archetypical female athlete traits on her 5'7",
130-pound frame - toned arms, long and well-muscled legs, a slim wasp waist,
perky and natural 34C breasts, and a round, hard dancer's ass.

She took equal pride in her beauty and her intelligence, knowing that both
were vital to getting ahead in her line of work. She loved outsmarting
opposing attorneys, and also enjoyed it when those men (and sometimes women)
were clearly attracted to her. But though she was ambitious, she hated the
petty office politics that everyone had to be dragged through. This case - if
it did turn out to be something more than a simple missing person, if she
solved the mystery - it would put her on the fast track to advancement and
reduce the number of years she would have to wait until she could rise above
her rivals.

Making a final adjustment to her hair, she checked her watch (a large-faced
gold man's Rolex that hung slightly loose on her slender wrist). It was almost
time. She quickly exited the restroom and headed out to her rented Nissan
Altima.

It was a brief five-minute drive across the small town to the home of her
contact, a man named Carl. Carl had been the closest thing to a caretaker for
the Vonn mansion, driving up there once a week to clean up the grounds,
deliver supplies, and check in on the old man.

Carl turned out to be a gray-haired but wiry man in his late fifties. He knew
little more than what Krista had already learned from her file. He informed
her that on one of his weekly visits, he had discovered old Anton Vonn
peacefully dead in his bed and had called the authorities. As for the missing
nephew, Darren Vonn, Carl had last spoken to him two days before he had
discovered Anton dead, and hadn't seen Darren since then.

"Would you like me to take you to Darren's house to look around?" Carl asked.

Krista shook her head. "The cops probably combed the place already. I'd rather
go out to Anton's mansion. The old man apparently died a natural death, so the
police wouldn't have looked around too closely. Anyway, it gets dark early,
and I'd like to use what daylight we have to look around."

"If that's what you want, miss. It's about twenty miles out of town, with a
bumpy dirt road the whole way. What kind of car did you rent?"

"Altima. The rental place was all out of four-wheel drives."

"Then we should take my Jeep. Come on."

* * *

Krista looked out at the gray sky as the Jeep bounced along the narrow dirt
road, meandering between the tall trees of the dark forest. Quite a contrast
in the weather, going from 75 degrees and sunny in Dallas to 35 and cloudy
here. It looked like it might rain, or perhaps snow.

She looked over at Carl. "Have you heard the rumors that old Anton was...a
vampire?"

"Of course, miss. Rumors are all over town. The whole thing is ridiculous, of
course. Vampires? For real? Come on. But people in towns like these are
superstitious, and like to believe anything as long as it sounds cool and dark
and scary."

"What about the body disappearing?"

"Probably some of our local punk kids stole it as a prank. We've been having
some issues with a group of our local teenage boys. They think of themselves
as some kind of occult club, and they've really been getting into this whole
vampire thing. Wouldn't suprise me a bit if they lifted that corpse for some
kind of so-called ritual."

"And Darren? What do you think happened to him?"

"Don't know. The guy was always going off on unannounced trips, though. Most
likely he's off on one now and will turn up a few days later."

Krista nodded, but she was skeptical. Darren vanishing at the same time that
Anton died...it was too much to be a coincidence. No, something more was going
on here, vampires or not.

When they finally reached their destination, Carl parked the Jeep near the
front entrance. Krista climbed out from the passenger seat, stretched her
limbs, and looked around.

The large two-story mansion was built in the Gothic style. At first glance, it
appeared luxurious and elegant, but a closer look revealed scratched walls, a
damaged roof, and boarded-up windows. That, combined with the gloomy skies and
the dark woods all around, made for the perfect archetypical eerie vampire
setting, Krista couldn't help thinking. As a cold wind began blowing, she
shivered despite the warm coat she was wearing.

Carl unlocked the front door with a key from his large ring. As she followed
him in, Krista stopped in surprise at how warm the interior was. "The heat
shouldn't be on, should it?"

The caretaker shook his head. "No. Dunno why it's on. No one should be here."
He took off his heavy pea jacket. Krista removed her long black coat, standing
there in her black leather pants, knee-high black leather boots, and white
blouse.

"So where should we start..." she began, but stopped upon hearing a noise.
"That sounded like footsteps," she whispered.

Carl, an alarmed look now on his face, nodded. "Sounds like it's coming from
behind there," he whispered back, pointing to a heavy oak door on the right
side of the entrance hall.

"Well, shall we? I wish I had a vampire stake or something." Krista's words
were only half joking.

Carl made his way over to the door, Krista right behind him. On the count of
three, Carl yanked it open suddenly.

A large and dusty dining room was revealed. A long table surrounded by ten
high-backed chairs was in the center of the room, but there was no one else
there. "You sure those were footsteps?" he whispered.

"Pretty sure. But there are no other humans here. Whoever it was must have
gone out the other door."

"Unless whoever - or whatever - it was isn't human..."

"I thought you said you didn't believe in that stuff."

"That was before all this happened."

"Well, we're not going to figure anything out just standing here," said
Krista. "Let's check the next room."

The next room turned out to be a large, empty kitchen. The far side of the
kitchen opened up into another hallway. "Let's split up and each take a
direction," she said. "We can meet up at the front entrance. If we don't find
anything, we can check upstairs next."

"You sure you're going to be all right by yourself, miss?" Carl asked.

She laughed, flexing her right bicep, which bulged underneath her blouse.
"Don't worry about me. I can take care of myself."

Krista went through several uninhabited rooms, including a study, a library,
and a living room. As each room turned out to be empty, she relaxed a little.
That was why she was so startled when she opened the next door.

A teenage boy was in the room. He stared at her for a second, then took off
running. "Hey!" she yelled as she began chasing him.

The boy raced around a corner. Then came the sound of a heavy collision.
Krista rounded the corner and saw the boy entangled on the floor with Carl.

"Come on, get up, kid," she said, yanking the boy to his feet. She then helped
Carl up.

The caretaker took a close look at the boy. "Joey? What are you doing in
here?"

"You know this guy?" she asked.

"Yeah, he's one of our local kids into that whole occult thing." Carl gave
Joey a hard stare. "Did you punks break into this place for your silly vampire
games?"

"We didn't break in! One of the back windows was open!" Joey protested.

"You're still trespassing on private property," Krista scolded him. "Now how
many others are there?"

"Just two of my buddies, Zach and Willie. They're upstairs..."

He was suddenly interrupted by a loud, high-pitched but male, and terrified
scream coming from above, followed by the sound of something heavy falling
down the stairs. "Oh, shit! That sounded like Willie!" cried Joey.

They all raced to the staircase. At the bottom of the stairs lay the corpse of
a teenage boy. His dead eyes stared up at the ceiling, and his body was
deathly pale - as if all the blood had been drained out of him.

"Willie! Nooo!" cried Joey.

Krista bent over the body. She paled as she saw two fang-like marks on the
neck. "Are those what I think they are?"

"Holy shit," said Carl. "The rumors were right all along. There is a vampire!
We have to get out of here!"

"Wait," said Krista, turning to Joey. "What about your other friend, Zach?"

"He should be upstairs..."

"Then we have to go up and find him. We can't leave him behind. Come on. The
three of us will go up together, rescue Zach, then we'll all get out of here
and get the police." She looked at each of the men in turn. Although they were
both trembling, they both nodded.

Krista, trying to control her own fear, was about to lead the way when
something like a basketball came rolling down the stairs. As it came to a
rest, she saw with horror that it was no basketball, but a decapitated human
head.

"Nooo! Zach!" cried Joey. He looked like he was about to faint.

"Now we're getting out of here!" shouted Carl. He turned and ran for the door,
Joey and Krista right behind him.

But as they got to the Jeep, they froze. All four tires had been slashed.
"What the fuck..." said Krista.

Carl turned to Joey. "Did you punks slash my tires?"

"No, I swear! We don't do that stupid shit, we're just trying to learn about
the occ...fuck, that's not important now! But we're not vandals!"

"What about your vehicle?" Krista interjected. "You must have one; you guys
couldn't have walked here."

"Yeah, we came in Zach's pickup truck. But he still has the keys. I mean, he
did. I mean...you know what I mean."

"We can't go back in there!" said Carl. "Not with that bloodthirsty vampire
loose!"

"It's okay," said Krista. "I know how to hotwire a car. Come on, Joey. Lead
the way."

As they walked quickly and nervously around the side of the mansion, Carl
asked, "Are you sure you can get the car started, Krista?"

"Positive. I've done it many times..." She stopped when she saw Joey staring
at something.

"Won't matter either way." The teen pointed at the pickup with four slashed
tires. He swallowed hard. "Whatever got Willie and Zach...the vampire...it's
not going to let us leave. It's going to kill us all..."

"We're not going to make it that easy." Krista had already taken out her cell
phone.

"No good. There's never any reception out here," said Carl.

"So what are we going to do?" Joey was shivering, both from the cold and from
fear.

"We could walk back to town..." she began.

Carl shook his head. "It's twenty miles. We'd never make it before dark, and
there's going to be a wind chill of below zero tonight. We'd die of exposure."

"Better that than having all the blood sucked out of you!" said Joey.

"No," said Krista, trying to hide the fear and uncertainty in her voice. "No
one else is going to die. Now we're going to go back into the mansion all
together..."

"Surely you're not saying we're going to spend the night in there!" Joey
cried.

"No. We're going to look for another way to call for help. Now there's no
phone line leading to the house, but there must be somthing else, a
radio...some way. Also..." She turned to Carl. "Did Anton keep any weapons in
the house? Anything we can use to protect ourselves?"

"Yes. I think he had something in his downstairs study."

"Good. We'll go there first."

The three of them approached the wide open front door again, Krista in the
lead. She listened carefully. Nothing.

"Okay," she whispered. "Follow me, I was in the study earlier. Everybody stay
together."

They tiptoed single file into the mansion, Krista in the lead, Joey right
behind her, and Carl in the rear. As they made their way around a corner, all
of them jumped when there was a loud bang behind them. "What was that?" Joey
demanded.

"Just the wind blowing the front door shut," Krista replied. "Now come on."

When they had almost reached the study, she relaxed ever so slightly. It was
at that point when the scream came, followed by a thud. She and Joey both
whirled around to discover that Carl had disappeared.

"Shit! It got him too!" Joey shrieked.

Krista kicked open the door to the study with her big black boot. Seeing it
empty, she yanked the teen inside, then closed the door and barricaded it with
a heavy oak table. "Now listen. We need to find some kind of weapons so we can
have a fighting chance against...whatever it is we're up against. Then we can
go look for Carl, if he's...Anyway, come on and help me search."

A thorough examination of the study revealed no radio, but there were two
handguns in separate drawers - a 9mm pistol and a .44 magnum revolver - along
with a single loaded magazine for the pistol and six bullets for the revolver.
Krista handed the pistol to Joey. "Here, take this one. That .44 will have a
strong kick, and my wrists are probably stronger than yours." She swiftly and
expertly loaded the revolver, then cocked the large and shiny weapon.

"You know how to use that?" she asked. Joey nodded as he loaded the pistol,
though his hands were trembling.

Krista's heart rate slowed slightly for the first time in a while. She looked
over at her companion. "Sorry about your friends," she said.

Joey's lower lip began to quiver. "We just wanted to have some fun and learn
about the occult at the same time! And then a real vampire showed up and
started killing...It's going to kill us all!"

She held him protectively. "No. I don't believe in vampires. I think those
murders were the work of an evil but human killer who wants to play vampire.
Blood can be drained with instruments made to look like fang marks. We have
weapons now. We can protect ourselves."

Joey calmed down and looked at her gratefully. "Thank you for that. So...are
you a soldier or warrior princess of some sort?"

She laughed. "No. I'm an attorney." She gave a brief explanation of the case
that had brought her there. "Why did you think I was a..."

"The way you're so brave and calm and fearless, the way you're clearly an
expert with weapons...Not your stereotypical lady lawyer, that's for sure."

"Well, part of being the liberated woman I am is knowing how to protect
myself. And protect others. And I'm not fearless. Trust me, I'm as scared as
you are. I'm just better at hiding it."

He nodded. "So what are we going to do?"

"Well, first we should go and look for Carl, see if he's still alive. Then we
need to find a way to call for help..." She suddenly froze when she heard
footsteps in the hall outside. Coming closer, slowly but surely.

"Shit. Hide! Quickly! Under the desk." She motioned for Joey to move, then
took up a position in the corner, aiming her gun at the door.

The footsteps stopped right in front of the study. Then there was a banging on
the door. Whoever...or whatever...it was, was trying to break it down.

Krista swallowed hard. "Stay there and shoot when I start shooting!" she
instructed Joey. The banging continued, and cracks began appearing in the
wooden door, growing larger and larger. Finally, the door and the table in
front of it shattered and a male figure entered the study.

She stared, recognizing him from the picture she had seen in the case file.
"Darren? Is that you? Darren Vonn?"

Darren stepped further into the room and smiled...showing a set of fangs.
There was a mirror in the study, and Krista could see that he was not
reflected in it. "Holy shit, a real vampire..."

The vampire smiled wider. "Yes. A nightmare come true."

"What did you do with Carl? Where is he?" she demanded.

"Nothing. It was my uncle who took care of him. Anton, the elder vampire."

"And my friends? Zach and Willie?" Joey said from under the desk.

"That was I," said Darren in an emotionless voice.

"You fucker!" Joey shot the vampire in the chest, but the creature simply
stood there and smirked as the wound instantly healed. Joey fired again,
aiming for the head. A neat 9mm hole appeared in the vampire's forehead for an
instant, then immediately healed as well. "What the fuck...how can you...no
way..."

"That would kill a zombie, but I'm a vampire. Our healing powers are..."

Its head suddenly exploded in a gory burst of red and brown goo as Krista's
powerful .44 magnum round slammed into it. "Try healing from THAT," she said
as the headless corpse slumped down.

She turned to Joey. "You all right?"

"Y...yes, Krista." He couldn't stop staring at the decapitated vampire body.

She went over and helped him out from under the desk. "You were very brave."

"T...thanks, I guess. So what do we do now?"

"We still need to find a way to call for help. Come on, let's keep searching
the mansion."

"What about Anton, the elder vampire? He's still out there..."

Krista patted her revolver. "If he tries to get in our way, I'll blow his head
off too."

They searched all the remaining downstairs rooms one by one, always
hypervigilant for a vampire ambush and jumping at every little sound. But they
found nothing - nothing that could help them and no sign of Anton.

"Come on," said Krista. "Let's go search upstairs."

"U...upstairs?" stammered Joey. "That's where..."

She turned and grasped his hand comfortingly, looking straight into his eyes,
as he was the same height as her. "I know that's where your friends were
killed. And I'm sorry it has to be this way. But we need to find something
that can help us, and we can't get separated. I'd tell you to wait outside,
but it's a cloudy day and Vampire Anton wouldn't have any problem going out
there. We have to do it. If you need a few minutes, we can wait."

He swallowed hard. "No, I'm ready."

She smiled and squeezed his hand. "Come on. Let's put an end to this wannabe
Dracula's reign of terror."

Krista led the way up the staircase, Joey right behind her. The stairs creaked
loudly as they ascended them, adding to the atmosphere of dread.

There were four bedrooms upstairs. They searched them one by one, finding
nothing of use in the first three. When they reached the closed door to the
fourth, Joey paused. "That's old Anton's master bedroom. I bet he's in there."

"Maybe. Maybe not," Krista whispered back. "Only one way to find out."
Gripping her revolver tightly, the muscles in her tanned forearm standing out
at full strain next to the rolled-up sleeve of her white blouse, she prepared
to kick open the door.

The room appeared as abandoned as the others. In the center of the large
bedroom sat a fancy-looking king-size bed with four elegant wooden bedposts. A
desk, chair, and several chests of drawers, all expensive and antique-looking,
lined one wall. On the other side was a closet door, firmly shut.

Krista nodded at the closet, motioning for Joey to follow close behind her.
They approached it cautiously, guns at the ready. She reached out, her .44 in
her right hand, then suddenly yanked the door open with her left.

The headless body inside, hanging on a pair of coat hooks, startled them both,
Joey more so. Consumed by panic and terror, he fired several rounds wildly
into the body's torso, then turned and ran, screaming.

"Joey! No! Come back!" Krista began running after him. Suddenly, there came
the sounds of a scuffle in the hallway, followed by more gunshots. She was
about to dash into the hall when Joey's head appeared in the doorway.

"Joey. Get back in here. We have to stay togeth..."

The head fell to the floor, revealing that it had been decapitated. A second
later, a figure entered the bedroom - an old man, carrying a sword.

"Anton Vonn," she growled as she recognized him from his picture in the file.

"Yes. It is I." He looked dispassionately at Joey's severed head. "Poor boy.
Must have had quite a panic when he found his friend Zach in the closet. Well,
most of him, anyway."

"You fucker!" Krista fired a shot at Anton's head. At least, she thought she
had. But there was a blur, then he reappeared, safely two feet to the side as
the bullet thudded harmlessly into the wall behind him.

"Vampire speed," he said calmly. "My nephew was a fool. He let you catch him
unaware. But I..."

She fired again. This time, he simply deflected the bullet with his sword,
sending it into the wooden side of the bed.

He began advancing on her. She fired her last three rounds, aiming for
different points each time, but the superhumanly fast vampire was able to
dodge or deflect each bullet. He leapt at her, flashing his blade. She
gracefully backflipped onto the bed to avoid it.

Krista threw down her empty revolver, eyes darting wildly around the room for
a weapon, as the vampire began advancing again. As her gaze passed over the
bedposts, she suddenly nodded. A powerful kick from her booted foot broke the
nearest one. She now had a makeshift club.

They dueled, his sword against her club. She parried his attacks as best she
could, knowing it was only a matter of time. There was no way she could win
against his superior strength and speed. Several times she came very close to
being impaled or disemboweled, and only her lightning-quick back flips or
cartwheels enabled her to avoid a gruesome death. Finally, however, a sudden
kick to her arm from the vampire caused her to drop her weapon.

He jumped on top of her on the bed, pressing his blade against her throat. "An
impressive performance...for a mortal. But you're no match for a vampire." He
opened his mouth, showing his fangs. "Soon, however, you will experience
vampire abilities firsthan..."

Anton let out a scream as Krista impaled him in the torso with the jagged,
sharp end of the broken wooden bedpost. Then his body crumbled away into dust.

"They always stop to gloat. It's like they just can't help themselves," she
remarked to herself. Picking up her makeshift stake in one hand and the late
Anton's sword in the other, she stood up and elegantly front flipped off the
bed, landing neatly on her booted feet. She hurried out into the hall, shaking
her head sadly at Joey's beheaded body, his empty pistol lying next to him.

"At least he went out fighting," she said softly. Then she got back to
business, continuing her search of the mansion. Though she had killed both
vampires, she remained on high alert. She wasn't going to relax until she got
safely back to town. And considering what she had been through, maybe not even
then.

Near the end of the upstairs hallway, she noticed something strange on the
wall. Tucking her sword into her pants, she began fiddling with the wall
section. After a few moments, there was a whirring noise and a panel slid
open, revealing a hidden doorway with a secret staircase behind it. "Gotcha,"
she said.

The staircase was spiral-shaped and very narrow. It continued down past where
the ground floor would be, although there was no exit to there. It finally
emerged into a large, empty basement.

She began exploring it cautiously. There didn't seem to be anything there,
but...She remembered the secret door. Perhaps there was another one down here,
too. She began checking the walls carefully.

It wasn't long before she found it. A secret panel opened up a new section of
the basement. Inside was what looked like a fully equipped mad scientist's
laboratory, along with several coffins. "What the..."

Suddenly, she sensed a presence behind her. She began turning around, but was
hit hard on the head and slumped to the floor, unconscious.

* * *

Krista awoke with a terrible headache. Wanting to hold her head, she
discovered that she was sitting, tied to a chair, with her hands tied behind
her back. Even her ankles were bound to the legs of the chair.

A noise from across the room made her look up. She stared at the figure she
saw. "Carl? How..."

She froze as she noticed the nearby mirror...that Carl was not reflected in.
She gulped as the realization hit her. "It was you all along, wasn't it. You
were the mastermind, the true elder vampire. Not Anton or Darren."

"Correct, young lady," said Carl, turning towards her and showing his fangs
for the first time. "A simple matter of slashing my own tires, and the ones on
Zach's truck too, the first time we were separated. Then the old scream and
disappear trick. Anton and Darren were merely my minions. After I turned them
into vampires, of course. It was easy to bend them to my will. No one ever
suspected me. Carl, the harmless caretaker? No way. Spooky old Anton was the
vampire lord, he had to be." He chuckled.

"But why?" Krista demanded.

"Why?" Carl laughed. "The same reason anyone else throughout history who
wanted to become a vampire desired it. To live forever." His voice was loud
and aggressive, but she could detect the insecurity underneath.

"It was power, wasn't it," she said. "Your desire for power. You were indeed
Carl the harmless caretaker. A lonely old man stuck in a small town. A small
fish in a small pond. A man who had nothing, was going nowhere, and knew it
all too well. It made you insecure, and that insecurity must have eaten away
at you. Enough to make you turn a couple of regular guys into evil monsters
and kill innocent kids." As she spoke, she began trying to loosen the bonds
around her wrists, hidden behind her back.

"Shut up, bitch!" he shrilled angrily. He began advancing on her. "I merely
took what I was rightfully entitled to, that which life denied me. Life isn't
fair. I heard that a thousand times. Until finally I decided to turn it around
and MAKE it fair for ME! Those punk kids were already getting more sex than I
had ever gotten even though I was three times their age! Why should I feel
sorry for them!"

She nodded as she continued loosening her ropes. "Ah, the stereotypical
frustrated incel. A classic case."

Carl glared at her as he came closer. "No one's going to disrespect me
anymore! I have all the power now!" He pointed to the laboratory equipment.
"After all these years, after all that work...finally, I'm going to get the
life I deserve."

"So how did you do it?" she asked, knowing that appealing to his ego would buy
her time.

"I knew the old man well. When he was younger, Anton did a lot of research
into vampires. But eventually, he got bored of it after not getting anywhere.
So I decided to pick up where he'd left off. I started studying his papers,
his experiments... Sometimes I'd even stay overnight in the mansion or make
secret trips there, hiding in the basement. The old man never had a clue.
Slowly but surely, I got closer and closer to the secret of becoming a
vampire, the secret of immortality."

"Then one day, on one of my secret trips, I found that old Anton had kicked
the bucket. Died peacefully in his sleep. This presented some new
opportunities, but it also raised the issue of Darren, the nephew. I knew I
had to get rid of him. Not only would it give me a chance to get the mansion
for myself, it would also give me another body to work with. So I drove back
to town and went straight to Darren's house. I told him that his uncle had
died and asked him to come with me to the mansion, making sure he didn't have
the chance to tell anyone where he was going. While Darren was in the old
man's bedroom saying his final goodbyes, I snuck up behind him and strangled
him to death with an extension cord. Then I dragged his corpse to the basement
and put it in one of the coffins in the secret room."

"I waited until the day of my scheduled weekly visit to notify the authorities
of Anton's death. I made sure everything was nice and clean. There was no
danger, there was no reason for anyone to search the basement, and they
wouldn't have found the secret room anyway. A couple of days later, I broke
into the funeral home one night, stole Anton's body, drove it back to the
mansion, and stashed it in a coffin next to Darren's. Now I had two bodies to
work with, and with Anton's corpse disappearing, any vampire talk would be
focused on him, not me."

"Now that I could work without any distractions, I quickly finished the final
part of my research. I was ready. I turned myself into a vampire. Then I bit
Anton and Darren to turn them into my vampire minions."

"Then, of course, I received a call from your law firm, saying that they were
sending an attorney to meet with me. I wasn't scared. I had nothing to fear
anymore. Just another soon to be ex-human to become another vampire minion."
He smiled, showing his fangs, as he reached her and noticed her partially
untied ropes. "A day late and a dollar short." He opened his mouth wide.

Krista, though she was trembling with terror inside, didn't let it show. Her
blue eyes remained defiantly open to the end, refusing to close or turn away.
Carl tried to hide his frustration, wishing he could make her beg. Make her
show her fear. Make himself feel like the big man he had never been in his
human life. But though he had all the power, all the cards, had her completely
helpless, he still couldn't dominate her.

It didn't matter, he tried to tell himself. Once he turned her, she would be
his. Forever. He made sure to show her a cocky and arrogant smirk before
sinking his fangs into her neck.

* * *

"Well, my loyal minion? How do you feel?"

Krista opened her eyes. She had been untied and placed to rest on the floor.
She stood up slowly, feeling for the bite marks on her neck, but they had
already healed. She tried to think. She still remembered every detail about
her old life, but all the emotions that had previously been attached to them
were gone. Gone forever.

"N...nothing. I feel nothing."

"Perfect. That's exactly how you should feel." Carl turned, striding with the
confidence of a man...or creature...who was the master of his domain.

She struck with her new, inhuman vampire speed, doing a pair of unbelievably
fast standing back handsprings to take herself over to her weapons, which were
lying on the floor nearby. She snatched up the sword and delivered a graceful,
fluid low slash. Carl screamed as the razor-sharp blade effortlessly sliced
through both his ankles, severing his feet from the rest of his body. Though
he didn't bleed, the laws of physics still applied and he fell hard on his
back, no longer able to stand. "What the fuck...no...how is this
possible...you were supposed to..."

She looked down at him dominantly. "Supposed to what? Be your obedient little
servant? Well, maybe your formula wasn't as perfect as you thought it was.
Maybe you were able to dominate Anton and Darren because they were mentally
weak. But I'm not weak."

He began crawling away, using his arms. Two swift swings of her sword cut both
his arms off and put a stop to that. Though he didn't feel pain, he was still
screaming. Screaming in terror.

She kicked him hard with her big black boot, sending him over again onto his
back. "Looks like your reign as self-styled vampire overlord was a very short
one."

He saw that she now had the sharp wooden piece of broken bedpost in her hand,
and began to beg. "Please, Miss Krista, don't kill me. I'll be your loyal
vampire minion! I'll do anything you want! Please!" His voice turned into a
whimper as he pleaded.

She kicked him again, shutting him up. "When you had me tied up in that chair,
ready to be bitten, I took it like a man. Now why don't you take your
comeuppance like a man instead of whining like a little bitchboy?" As she
spoke, she stabbed the makeshift stake into his chest. Not deep enough to
pierce his heart, just enough to make it stick. She then raised her right leg.

Her voice lowered to a whisper. "I may have felt nothing before. But this?
This feels GOOD." She savored the look of pure fear and helplessness in his
inhuman eyes for one last moment, then stomped down hard with her boot,
impaling the sharp piece of wood all the way into him. With a final scream,
Carl's body crumbled away into dust.

Krista looked at the empty space in satisfaction, then stretched her limbs.
She had always been very athletic, but she could feel the new power, speed,
and agility flowing through her. She executed a standing double full twist
with no effort, landing perfectly, then flashed over to the other edge of the
basement with her new superhuman speed. She punched the concrete wall, leaving
a massive hole. It was like hitting tissue paper. She smiled.

Wanting to see what her new fangs looked like, she went over to the mirror.
She grunted in irritation when she saw nothing there. "Right. No reflection,"
she said to herself. Doing her hair and makeup in the morning was going to be
an annoyance.

She began to feel the hunger. The need to feed. The need for blood...

It was a quick and easy trip back to town with her new abilities. She didn't
even feel the cold at all. Once back in town, she began stalking the back
streets, checking the houses with her heightened senses. She planned on being
discreet. Being smart.

It wasn't long before she found what she wanted - an old man, living alone. He
was sitting on his couch, watching TV. With her perfect stealth, better than
any cat, she slipped onto the couch next to him.

He turned and stared. She let him be in awe of her beauty for a few seconds
before showing her fangs and watching his expression turn to one of pure
terror. He didn't have time to scream, she was far too quick for that.

She smiled in satisfaction as she slurped the last of his blood, leaving the
body sitting on the couch. Most likely no one would find it until long after
she had left town. She gave it one last glance before she left, knowing that
it would be the first of many.

* * *

SIX MONTHS LATER

"Miss Winter, this court finds in favor of your client. Case closed." The
judge banged his gavel.

Krista smiled, keeping her fangs hidden. "Thank you, Your Honor." Another
victory for the law firm of Merrell, Rothstein, and Winter. Poor Mr. Hogarth,
her former boss. She had been cautious, waiting until just the right time. No
one would ever find his body - what remained of it, anyway. After his unsolved
disappearance, her swift resolution of the Vonn case, combined with her
increased intelligence, aggression, and ruthlessness from being a vampire, had
made her a shoo-in to take Hogarth's position as the third equity partner in
the firm.

As for Merrell and Rothstein, their time would come. Not too quickly, of
course; she didn't want people to get suspicious, but she was immortal now.
She could afford to wait. Eventually, this powerful law firm would be under
her sole control. And then there were other businesses and organizations that
she could take over. Someday, she would have an empire.

Her opponent who had just lost glared over at her. "Bloodsucking lawyer," he
muttered.

She smirked to herself. "You don't know how right you are."

THE END...for now

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