I Never Wanted This

I never wanted this!

Yes, I have chosen this, true, but cherry picking from a very small list of undesirable alternatives. You know how that happens? I was kidnapped by accident. Made a friend during captivity and we tried to escape, in a moment of desperation I admitted he had more chance than run away than I had, our captors about to catch us. I do sacrificed myself to improve his chances.

In part because I had a drop of hope that he would come back with the police, mostly because my leg was too hurt and I was too tired to keep running anyway. I was as likely to die being carried back to the cage as I was to face more torture.

Guy didn’t came back with the police. Turns out he was some heir of a quasi divine specie of inter-dimensional aliens. Allegedly the creators of our entire universe and a handful of others.

His parents, he had know noting about up to this moment, made contact. Their rules prevented direct interference in his favour while he was a prisoner. They allowed them to relocate him to some other neighbourhood, galaxies away, presumably one with better schools and less kidnapping. He asked for my promotion to the best situation possible, as a reward for my sacrifice. Sign of friendship. Again, I am speculating here.

On planet Earth that request means the promotion from prey to predator. From human to vampire. The responsible bureaucrat AI in the sector went one step further, for literality sake, and upgraded my vampiric condition to something that should not exist on planet Earth. Making me the top predator, of top predators.

If I had simply taken that, with a simile of gratitude, and any decent human being would. My existence after that point would have been as intended, all pleasure, no worries.

Instead, I decided that would not work for me.

I had friends, I had family, the deal implied solitary existence leaving all ties with humanity behind. Comes with “vampiric condition”.

Only humans in the life of vampires are the human members of their family. Only way to upgrade my living friends and relatives to the status of human members of a vampiric family, was to start my vampiric existence as head of a vampiric family.

That, was complicated. I had to sacrifice much of that easy way in, to get that status without create inconvenient consequences for the system.

“Whatever it takes!”

Was my choice.

Once I knew the human condition on Earth is the role of prey for supernatural predators, I simply could not leave the people important to me in that condition. When I was ascending above it, by a crazy turn of luck.

Now here I am, rebuilding ruins of a Vampiric Domain, in a violated fortress. Cooking my human family and friends back from stone to flesh, with secret spells of Extra-terrestrial magic. Stolen from gorgon matrons, who I devoured to consume their knowledge and powers. My vampire wife is back by my side after endure the same process.

Taking how traumatic it was for a woman like her, thousands of years old, tested by many tribulations in other galaxies and by the empty void between universes. I imagine the experience will leave deep scars in the sous of my people.

The people I was trying to protect, when I decided to build this stronghold.

Since that invasion, and the events that followed, my mind cleared. The powers available to me have expanded to a new scale of magnitude. What brough me better understanding about our universe and how it work. I know how far I am from being powerful enough to protect my family against the vampires of Earth, if they choose to join against my family.

Now I understand they would join forces to destroy me, immediately. If they knew the sort of powers I am destined to develop over time. The kind of being I am, right now.

They assume that I am a vampire of the same kind of them, approximately. Bind to the same parameters that govern their timeless existence.

That illusion may become unnecessary to protect myself soon, if my power keeps growing as it has in recent nights, but the protection of my family will demand the illusion to continue. For indefinitely, possibly for millennia.

Xamaphir, the first person I turned into a vampire, was not human. She was a gorgon female, one of those who refused to follow her traitor sisters, when they joined forces against their leader. The gorgon who had firmed a pact with my family, to live in our land, under our protection. And work for us, under my laws.

My first child of the night was afraid that I would no longer trust her people. After some of them betray my family. That’s the main reason why she decided to ask to be turned into vampire. The bond between child and the creator all but guarantees loyalty, at very least it guarantees obedience for a long time.

However, also, vampires never age. This is an interesting detail when you deal with gorgons. Because some of them are as ageless as vampires.

Some of them age and die from causes related to old age, enjoying lifespans of thousands of years, but still. Limited life spans. Difference is determined in the moment of conception, and it is random. So, those who are born destined to age and die share the same culture and the same life of their sisters who are destined to live forever. Stressing gap, as you may imagine.

About that “sisters”, not “brothers”. Minotaurs are all male, they have humans and other humanoids captured as sexual slaves. All male children are minotaurs, all daughters of minotaurs belong to their mother’s species. Gorgons are not the opposite of that.

They have males, those are just rare. About 10.000 females are born for each male. Then, the males are hyper-competitive and tend to kill each other often, what makes them even harder to find.

The female medusas are draw to those males, once they approach one their will dissolves and their personality is reshaped to please the male. He selects the best females as lovers, to breed new generations of the specie. Uses the other as his army of drones. They cannot escape or disobey him.

Gorgons are born from eggs, and when the eggs of females hatch far away from any male, the medusa females avoid the natural fate of submission.

Instead, they invert the relation and became tyrant dominatrix characters, imposing their will over their weaker sister. Who on their turn slave the males of other species. The group living under my protection was among the most subtle and kind you can hope to find.

Gorgons and minotaurs are both outsiders. Not native species of Earth, not supposed to stablish significant populations here.

Vampires enjoy more tolerance from the system designed by the Creator Race to administrate the pockets of life in the universes made by them. What is why races like those need to constantly associate themselves with vampire families, if they want to stay on Earth or have nowhere else to go.

Being turned into a vampire made Xamaphir as biologically immortal as her luckier sisters. Janaina, my only cousin who accepted to be turned into a vampire and was turned by my wife, was very happy to get some other child of the night to share experiences. Albeit, a little jealous of that gorgon vampire.

I sleep in my own bed again, most days. With my wife by my side. She says it helps her healing. But I can only let my guard down and dream without structured control of the dream when I am locked in the sarcophagus.

My power grows, my connection with the Abyss Root power grows with it. It makes me more useful, to protect those I love. Makes me more dangerous to them also, when I am not holding myself. Discipline is important, but movement is fundamental, trying to stay in control always leads to exhaustion and catastrophe.

V tells me to enjoy my power. Hunt more, fight powerful foes, lose myself in orgies with beautiful vampire nobles and slave-women. Because I can, because self-indulgence s builds save houses in the middle ground between absolute self-control and absolute savagery.

“Existence abhors absolutes” she says. “Negotiation is the only way, in out, ups and down. Contradictions, but spontaneous ones.”

I try to believe her. She is a wise woman, ancient enough to know.

She is by my side when we present our family in the Nocturnal Court. We are noble vampires by law now. The Englishman had done everything in his power to prevent that, and failed. He must, of course, keep trying to destroy us.

Our power is growing.

Despite the deep wounds we are healing. Our resources are better now than they where before the invasion.

We have not yet learned how to use what we have. We still have less people than we used to have, living here in our family domains. And despite all that, we are improving. Less vulnerable, more able to defend ourselves.

I believe we are finally finding our way. Everything is going to be alright, looks like.