Champagne Challenge #103...What happens after Mick tells Beth “I’m a vampire”. PG-13.
Time frame: the end of episode 2 ‘Out of the Past’
Mick’s POV
Yes, it’s true. I don’t own Moonlight, or any of its characters. No copyright infringement intended. Tip of the fedora to Trevor Munson and appreciative credits to Nutmegger911 for illuminating my errors.
Italicized words are thought, not spoken.
Forged from Fire
The stairs are cold and they press against my aching back and shoulders. I linger here flicking my lighter and feeling sorry for myself. I’m a vampire.
My words echo and bounce around the room like an insane ping pong ball getting caught in the art hung on the walls and flying through the jazz music that fills the air. Those three words reflect the change she saw in me and now that phrase will transform her. Forever.
My thumb twirls the wheel and jumps up the flame. Time ends and I am lost staring into the glow…its intensity, its colors dancing in the darkened room.
Beth saved me tonight. She killed a man I should have dealt with twenty-five years earlier. His silver bullets have been removed from me. I’ve consumed a couple of pints of blood and the holes have disappeared; the skin closed and the scars can’t be seen by the naked eye.
Click. The flame dies again as my thumb releases the tension on the lighter. I’m left in the darkness of the stairwell.
Oh God, what have I done?
I sit, reflecting. Tonight’s events have unintended consequences and they are huge. I have told a human, I’m a vampire.
I blurted it out to the one person who I hoped would never know. I would have hid my humiliation from her at all costs. But a door left open betrayed me.
Eyes wide with terror she asks, “What are you?” I hear her tentative footsteps on the wood floor as she creeps in to get a better view. Shame fills me. I can feel it, smell it. It is stronger than the pain and the fear; stronger even than my hunger for the healing liquid I’m sucking through the tubing connected to the blood bag.
“Get out! Get out now.” My anguished tone only draws her closer. Cowering in a tight ball of muscles and torn clothing I’m wedged under a table as if it would provide protection or solace from what is happening. I’m covered in my own ooze and body fluids and drenched in sweat. My body is racked with tremors caused by the silver. Spasms start my hands vibrating and the trembling turns the blood bag into a cocktail shaker. I am so tired. My back aches and my arms are useless weights hanging at my sides. Even the coppery drink doesn’t warm me.
Now Beth knows I am a monster; an undead creature living only for my next meal of human blood. A parasite. Never aging, I bounce through time hiding my existence from everyone I meet. I am an abomination that lives in movies and on TV and in the fantasies of silly teenagers at Halloween.
The truth is…vampires are real and I live by a code of secrecy that is strictly enforced. My carelessness puts her at peril and, as in our past, I have put her in danger once again. Both times I have seen that look of terror.
The metal feels cool in my hands and with a click my thumb turns the lighter back on and memories of twenty years ago flicker through my thoughts.
My wife brought Beth to me. For me. For us. Without Coraline’s insane idea that the girl would be our child and save our marriage Beth wouldn’t be in danger. I see only one solution. Slashing, vicious, barbaric…to survive the fight with Coraline is our sole choice. A smashed lantern and….
There is an acrid odor of dry wood burning. I see the flames and hear the crackle of the fire and the little girl’s fear fills the air with nectar as sweet as honey. Beth is crying and I can smell the salty wetness of her tears. She is terrified. The timbers in the old building catch on fire and they pop and explode sending showers of sparks into the air and onto the furniture in the room.
She looks up at me begging for help. Can I help her?
The fire rolls out like a thick carpet covering the floor with brilliant tints of red and orange and blue. The heat is unbearable. The fire is eating the oxygen and soon the little girl won’t be able to inhale. It won’t make a difference. If she does the heat will burn her lungs into unrecognizable organs. This is my fault.
Can I save her? I can’t even save me. The fire is unforgiving and doesn’t provide me choices.
In the end I leave my wife for dead and pick up the child like a doll and she and I run from the advancing fire.
Click. My thumb slips and the flame dies again. Reality intrudes, its daylight. I’ve been sitting here a long time and my muscles are cramping. It’s been a long night. I need time in my freezer, time without memories or dreams intruding into my sleep. When darkness comes again I’ll cope with the damage I’ve done today. The danger I’ve put Beth in.
Dawn streaks in through the wood shutters on the windows filtering in just enough light to shine into the darkest secret in my soul. I’m a vampire.
