Drumming Noise

Yes, that’s right, here’s another little story about vampires being evil, like they should be. If there’s one thing that I don’t want a bar of, it’s those pussy vampires! I mean, we are currently surrounded by ‘vegetarian’ vampires in fiction, and this has INCURED MY WRATH, especially after watching the not-so-scary-but-at-least-had-the-right-idea 1958 film of Dracula (it was for school). Having these lame vampires in fiction is like watching Jurassic Park with the dinos from The Land Before Time. In other words, it’s pretty damn shitty.
So here’s another reminder that vampires kill people. And drink their blood. And are pretty much just evil all round. Well, someone has to remind the world - particularly unintelligent preteen girls - that vampires KILL PEOPLE.That is what they do, and that is what I am making them do. I am restoring equilibrium to the universe.
PS. I was inspired to write this by Drumming Noise, a song by Florence + the Machine. You can ignore the horrifically-plaguirised insertion of lyric samples if you wish.

Drumming Noise

Mitchell paced from one busy street to another, walking in haphazard circles with no idea of where he was going. He’d spent all morning in bed, with the thick curtains drawn, alternating between sweating and shivering, with a throbbing pain in his head and feeling sick to his stomach. It was like the worst migraine and the worst flu had gotten together to wage war on his body. He’d been through it before but you could never get used to that sort of agony – especially when you knew exactly what to do to end it.

Mid-afternoon, he’d been overcome with the restlessness and feelings of panic and anxiety that were, in a way, worse than the pain. His body had warned him that he was hungry, and now it was urging him to get out and do something about it.

He knew that it was now that he was at his most dangerous, and yet he couldn’t stop himself from leaving the flat to walk amongst the innocent public, like a shark swimming through a school of fish.

The late-afternoon sun was low in the sky and not overly bright, but it made Mitchell feel dizzy and weak. He was already sick with hunger and the light sapped his strength further. But he couldn’t return home. The insatiable desire to feed drove him forward regardless of anything else. Right now he felt that he could stagger through Vatican City and attack the Pope if that was the only way he could feed.

Mitchell reeled forward and grabbed a lamppost to try and steady himself. He knew he probably looked dodgy as hell, standing there with his black coat and dark glasses, holding his head with one gloved hand and gripping the lamppost for dear life with the other. But it didn’t matter to him. Nothing mattered, apart from the ravaging hunger.

There’s a drumming noise inside my head
That starts when you’re around

People swirled past him and Mitchell cringed as the sound of their heartbeats filled his head. Some faster than others, some uneven, some louder and some quieter – the hearts of everyone surrounding him on the busy street drilled into his skull.

There’s a drumming noise inside my head
That throws me to the ground

The sound of a thousand beating hearts washed through Mitchell, forcing him to imagine the blood flowing in waves through the veins of the people around him. The sound was almost unbearable, like an army of dinner bells going off in his head, encouraging him to drink…feed…

I swear that you should hear it
It makes such an almighty sound

He looked up and around at the multitude of potential victims. The noise of the city – the car horns, the construction, the yelling and laughing – had dulled to a distant drone in the face of the incessant, resounding thud of the city’s beating hearts. Mitchell could hear every one of them, each one belonging to a person with blood in their veins and ignorance in their eyes.

Louder than sirens
Louder than bells
Sweeter than heaven
And hotter than hell

He was high on the sound. The prospect of being able to bite down and feel the warm liquid gushing over his tongue was driving out his pain and his weakness and his reason. He knew he shouldn’t, knew that he’d be undoing everything he’d worked towards, but the invasive thumping drowned out his rationality and filled him with the undeniable bloodlust that he’d tried so hard to defeat.

As I move my feet
Towards your body
I can feel this beat

From amongst the myriad of heartbeats Mitchell singled out one pulse. It was a slow, erratic rhythm - denoting weak prey. He knew that he’d never be able to hunt down and overcome any fit human in his pathetic state. His hunger drove him forward like adrenaline drives a wounded soldier in battle, but Mitchell couldn’t handle a real hunt. He started to lurch forward, moving to the unsteady beat of the heart he was tracking, like a tribal warrior dancing to the rhythm of the drums.

It fills my head up and gets louder and louder

As he staggered towards his prey Mitchell was overwhelmed by the sound of its heartbeat. Everything else was swallowed up by its insistent, hypnotic pulsing. The world could fall out of existence and he wouldn’t even notice, so long as that heartbeat didn’t stop.

It fills my head up and gets louder and louder

Mitchell tracked his prey to an alley off the main street. The smell of trash and piss hung heavy in the air but all he could smell was the tangy aroma of blood.

His quarry was squatting amidst the black rubbish bags with a bottle of whiskey in his hands. An old homeless drunk, as filthy as his surroundings, with a blanket wrapped around his wretched form. Mitchell approached him silently, his movements steadier now that his crosshair was resting on his target’s neck.

I run to the river and dive straight in
I pray that the water will drown out the din

Mitchell shot forward and grabbed the man by the throat, lifting him and pinning him to the wall. The drunk’s dull eyes widened in shock and terror as Mitchell’s turned black and his fangs slid out. He tightened his grip as the man struggled fitfully, relishing the power he held over this pitiful figure. This man was nothing to anyone, and to Mitchell he was even less. He was the lamb, and Mitchell was the slaughter.

But as the water fills my mouth
It couldn’t wash the echoes out

Mitchell sank his fangs into the man’s neck. He ignored the hoarse screams of his prey as he fed greedily on the blood that surged from the wounds he’d inflicted. The man’s heartbeat had increased violently, a deafening pounding in Mitchell’s ears, pushing the blood into his waiting mouth. It tasted of a lifetime of alcoholism but Mitchell didn’t care, because it was blood and he could feel it coursing through his body, returning his strength and making him feel alive.

The man’s screams died away into soft, pitiful moans as his heartbeat slowly subsided before stopping altogether. Mitchell continued to feed voraciously, sucking the blood from the man’s body, emptying his veins and arteries quickly and efficiently. A killing machine.

I swallow the sound and it swallows me whole
Till there’s nothing left inside my soul
As empty as that beating drum

Mitchell let the man’s pale, bloodless corpse fall to the dirty ground and wiped his mouth. His fangs shrank back into his gums and he waited for the moment of guilt and self-disgust. But even as he stared into his victim’s dead eyes, it didn’t come. He felt as remorseless and apathetic as he had a moment ago, when he had been a ravenous animal, a bloodthirsty predator. No-one had cared about this homeless drunk while he’d been living, and no-one cared now that he was dead. Mitchell had done the world a favour by getting rid of him, really.

He smirked as he looked down on the ugly carcass, then turned and left the alley.

Louder than sirens
Louder than bells
Sweeter than heaven
And hotter than hell

Mitchell prowled insidiously back through the crowded streets, a lion hiding in the long grass in the midst of the antelope. The pedestrians churned around him, ignorant of what he could do to them. He could hear their heartbeats, but they were no longer the sound of agonising temptation. They had morphed into the sound of a challenge.

It fills my head up and gets louder and louder

With his strength returned, Mitchell felt a different kind of bloodlust well up inside of him. It was the sanguinary, primal desire to single out prey, stalk it, chase it down, and suck out its life, all the while relishing the power he held over it. The craving was inherent, natural. He was an animal, made to hunt. He’d been wrong to try and deny his nature.

He felt a savage pleasure in watching the women who walked past, envisioning how he’d seduce and then destroy them. Their heartbeats pounded in his head as he imagined how he could speed them up and then slow them down, before stopping them forever.

Louder than sirens
Louder than bells
Sweeter than heaven
And hotter than hell
It fills my head up and gets louder and louder

Love Bite

You're getting hungry. The signs are showing.

You'd give anything for the embarrassing stomach rumbles that normal people get when they haven't eaten. Instead, you get the shakes, you get edgy, you break out in cold sweats. More like withdrawal symptoms than hunger pangs. To you, your food is a drug – more than just sustenance, harder to resist than any banquet.

Sometimes at work you have to go up to the hospital's detox wards. You see the junkies and the crankheads, coming up off their habits, weak and sick, shivering and muttering to themselves. At least, after 100 years, you've learned to control your symptoms. All part of the façade of normalcy.

You go down to the hospital's café. The girl at the counter must be new; you don't recognise her. She smiles as she hands you your coffee. She's pretty, but you can't risk it. Not now, not when you're like this.

You can't drink your coffee. It tastes wrong, even though it's exactly how you like it. It's too thin, too sweet, too hot. Thick and metallic, at 37°C – that's what you want, what you need.

No. You won't give in. It'll get easier. You don't want to be like the others. You aren't a monster.

The new girl at the counter somehow slips you her number. You fully intend to throw the little piece of paper out, but you don't seem to see any bins on the way to your locker, even though you're sure they're there.

Before you know it, you're at home, arranging to have a drink with the girl – Bethany, you learn her name is. George watches you while you're on the phone, and when you hang up he opens his mouth to lecture you, remind you of what could happen. You can't bear to listen to him – mainly because you know he's right. You leave the flat early to get away from his pointed looks which clearly say, 'don't do anything you'll regret tomorrow'.

You meet Bethany in the pub at the end of the road. You order a red wine – if you stare at it you can almost trick yourself that you've got what you want. When Bethany announces that she feels 'adventurous' and orders a Bloody Mary, you almost burst out laughing.

After only a few rounds she drags you back to her flat, despite your protests. You're trying to quit while you're ahead but she's having none of it. She sits you on the couch and pours you a drink while her iPod plays through the stereo.

When she sits next to you, the smell of her perfume is strong but not nearly strong enough. She's taken off the scarf she was wearing in the pub and you can see her pale neck, just there in front of you.

She talks a lot, about all sorts. You notice that she has a habit of flicking her hair to the side, exposing the side of her neck. She probably thinks it makes her look attractive, but to you it's like she's tempting you, all part of an elaborate suicide by proxy.

You try and focus on her eyes. You stare into them, concentrating on the innocence and humanity within the blue irises. But your gaze drifts to the delicate bloodlines in the corner of each eye. You couldn't see them a minute ago – she's moving slowly closer. Her scent is getting stronger as the distance between you dwindles.

You try and stare at the wall just behind her head and listen to the music in the background to block out your thoughts. You can hardly believe it – there's a song by Death Cab For Cutie, than one by Vampire Weekend. The irony is like something out of a bad film.

She closes the gap between you. She's hungry too, and she's coming in for the kill. You know you should leave but it's like you're pinned to the couch by her scent and your hunger.

She leans in and kisses you, and you don't resist even though you know you have to otherwise she's gone. You can't stop yourself from kissing her back, and moving your hands up to her soft, frail neck. As she unbuttons your shirt you pray that she wears a cross around her neck, because that's stopped you before, but the only necklace she has is a small 'B' on a gold chain. There's nothing to stop you, not even your own willpower. You're lost to the primal desires. A small part of you watches helplessly as you lose control, like a bystander watching a car hurtling off a cliff.
You break off from her lips, kissing along her jaw line then down to her neck. You can sense the blood flowing in waves through her jugular vein, being pushed along by her frantically-beating heart. She's too focused on your belt buckle to notice your eyes turn black.

She screams as you bite down and your fangs pierce through her skin to her throat. As the blood starts to flow and you start to feed, her scream turns to a whimper, then silence. You don't notice her body relax and crumple because your entire being is overcome by the ecstasy of the feed.

The blood flow lessens as her heart stops beating and you have to suck to continue to drink.

You break away from her and stand up, pushing her still-warm body off you. Deep red blood continues to ooze slowly from the tiny marks that you've left on her porcelain skin. You look down at her as you wipe your mouth and button your shirt. Her lipstick is smudged and her hair is tousled but she still looks beautiful, like a doll.

The stereo is still playing – an upbeat, happy song that doesn't fit the moment, but you can't make yourself go across the room to turn it off. Her blue eyes won't let you turn away even though they're now empty and lifeless.

You decide to finish her properly. She deserves a peaceful death, not an eternity plagued by the murderous hunger.

It doesn't take long to empty her veins, even though the bliss of feeding isn't as strong when mixed with self-disgust. When you lie her head back down on the couch, her face is pale under the concealer. There is no longer enough blood left in her body to spread your poison and turn her. You consider yourself merciful for giving her a real death, rather than the curse of immortality.

You wipe the blood from her neck before leaving her lying just as she fell. You know that there are others like you in the hospital and morgue who will attribute her death to internal bleeding or a heart attack. You don't have to worry about the clean-up. All you have to deal with is the guilt. Guilt at doing what you were made to do, to an innocent woman who never knew monsters existed until she took one home.

Her blood will keep you going for a good couple of weeks. But eventually the hunger will return, and you know that once again you will have to choose between your morality and your nature.

And you know that, like always, there won't really be a choice.