

Waxing Darkness

By Jose Luis Solórzano

Copyright 2012 Jose Luis Solórzano

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ISBN 978-1-4658-0029-9

For Chelsea, who has always been my inspiration to do great things such as this novel.

Fire and Ice

Some say the world will end in fire,

Some say in ice.

From what I tasted of desire

I hold with those who favor fire.

But if it had to perish twice,

I think i know enough of hate

To say that for destruction ice

Is also great

And would suffice.

\- Robert Frost

Chapter One: Accidents

To find where it starts,

it was the meeting of them.

Fate's cruel game is played.

One thing Luis Medina liked about the library was that it was quiet. No one seemed to mind him as he browsed through the shelves or reading small inserts from novels at his leisure. He would see the occasional summer school college student struggling to find a book that he or she desperately needed to find.

One thing that Luis hated about the library was that it had no air condition and it was the end of the month of June. His black hair was dripping sweat into his meek, brown eyes. The summer heat in El Paso, Texas was brutal throughout the entire day. Luis reflected on the days when he was a kid and still lived in Los Angeles, California, where he was able to visit the beach when it was hot outside and play in the cold, ocean water.

El Paso was nowhere near an ocean. El Paso, on the other hand, did have gangs, drug dealers on every street corner, bootleggers, and the occasional shooting ever few feet.

Today made it a week that Luis had been living in this heavily populated Northeastern Texas town. His mother, a short Mexican woman named Lupe, spent the past week unpacking boxes to make sure that the new house would fit her definition of perfect. Lupe's husband, a tall, blond Caucasian man named Joseph Medina found work as a defense attorney at a local law firm. Luis's older sister, a blonde, brown-eyed, busty girl named Ashley was probably spending her day sleeping.

For the past few days, Luis had decided to take refuge in the public library three blocks away from where his house was located. It was a much more enjoyable experience to him than helping his mom unpack or dealing with his older sister. To Luis, this was the best place in the world to be at.

There were some times where a group of teenagers would sit across from him, quietly gossiping about their cliques and circles. Luis would sometimes decide to pretend to read his book and listen in to what they were talking about, but he never once made any kind of communication with the others around him. Making friends didn't come easy to Luis, but that made moving away that much easier for him. There were people who would work with him for his determination and intellect, but there was nobody that Luis could really call his "friend" in Los Angeles.

Midway through the afternoon, Luis decided that he wanted to go back to the house, mostly because he was getting hungry and ran out of pocket snacks. With a five-hundred page book in his hand, he was ready to check out and return home. There was a small line of people in front of him, most of them being parents who were checking out picture books and loud animated movies for their noisy children.

A few seconds passed, and Luis felt someone bump right into his back, causing him to release his book from his arms and fall to the floor. Frantically, Luis turned around to pick up the fallen book, but it was already being handed to him by the person who bumped into him. It was a young girl, who looked to be the same age as Luis, although slightly taller than he was. She had long brown hair and her blue eyes were hidden by a pair of oval glasses. Luis couldn't help but stare at the girl as he clutched onto the book. What specifically caught his eye was the girl's smile. The brown haired girl's smile didn't seem forced or plastered on, but completely natural. To him, it seemed a bit exciting, but also scary.

"Thank you," Luis told the girl as he placed the book under his arm.

The girl simply nodded before she began picking up her own books, which were a variety of small paperbacks. Without hesitation, Luis aided the girl in picking up the books, mostly to find out why she was carrying so many.

"Err, you don't have to do that," The blue-eyed girl told Luis.

"It's fine," Luis told her without making eye contact. He flipped through one of the books briefly. On every single page were illustrations, actions, and bubbled dialogue. It was just a simple comic book to Luis. "Interesting." Luis muttered to himself.

"It's called a 'manga'," The girl told Luis in a slightly nervous voice. "It's from Japan, but it's been translated into English. You read it from right-to-left so the original art isn't altered; see?"

The girl grabbed the book out of Luis's hand and flipped it around to see the cover. It was all backwards, like she had said, and it was something that Luis found somewhat interesting. The two of them finished picking up the rest of the books and returned to their places in line. It wasn't even ten seconds later when the young girl tapped Luis on the shoulder.

"You're new around here, aren't you," The girl asked him with wide eyes.

"Uh, yeah," Luis answered in an uneven voice. The girl didn't stand out too much, but Luis clearly noticed that she was cute in her own right. He also wasn't good with one-on-one conversations with others in general. His throat felt as if it had turned into sand paper. "We moved here a week ago from Los Angeles," Luis informed her.

"Hollywood? Seriously?!" The girl's voice had grown much louder, almost as if she were surprised. Embarrassed, she hid her face under her stack of books. In a low whisper, she asked, "Why did you move to El Paso?"

Luis had the urge to say that it wasn't his choice to move here, but he didn't absolutely hate El Paso. Luis was just upset that his parents cared more for his older sister than they did about him.

"My sister was accepted to the University here," Luis informed the girl. "My parents thought that it would be best if we moved down here with her. There was no way they could have supported the two of us in two separate states, and they did NOT want her to give up on college."

"Still, it sounds a bit unfair for you," The girl commented as Luis reached the front of the check-out line. "What about school, and all of your friends?"

"I, um, really didn't have any friends over there. You wouldn't exactly call me a social person. And, I'm a pretty good student. If my credits transfer okay from my old school, I should be able to graduate in the spring."

"Same here." The girl's tone grew a bit more, but cautious of not yelling again. Luis had moved aside for the girl to check out her volumes of manga. "Which school are you going to be attending?"

"I'm not sure. Whatever's close to by our house I guess. I don't live too far from here."

"Montwood!" The girl looked Luis directly in the eyes and her small smile slightly widened. "You _need_ to go to Montwood High. That's where I've been going for the past three years. You need to hang out with me and my friends. A week with us, and your anti-social attitude will be a thing of the past; trust me. I'm Luna by the way."

"I'm Luis."

Luis didn't wish for his conversations with Luna to end, not yet. For some reason, it was easy for him to talk to her. There was a warm, welcoming aura around her; maybe it was her smile. The problem was that he couldn't think of anything to talk about and the two of them were obviously leaving the library.

"Goodbye Luis," Luna called out to him as the two of them parted ways outside of the library.

"See you later, Luna," he responded.

Luis liked the fact that someone was paying attention to him and actually listening to him. The walk home had become much more bearable for him; Luis couldn't even feel the heat of the sun stinging against his skin. Luis admitted to himself why it was so easy for him to talk to Luna. It was a "crush at first sight" kind of feeling, but he was sure that Luna didn't feel the same way about him. She was the kind of girl he expected to have a boyfriend. That didn't mean he couldn't enjoy his crush.

Even though it was scorching hot during the day, the nights in El Paso were always cool. At the downtown area, everything seemed to be a constant party, that is if you had the right amount of cash on hand. For the right price, you could get stoned, high, drunk, laid, or a combination of it all.

It was well past midnight, but it seemed like any of it was going to slow down. Inside one of the bars was a stout, middle-aged man, who was balding and drinking all of his pain away. All night long, the man drank, smoked, talked to women, and groped at every girl that passed his way.

Unfortunately for this man, he grabbed the wrong girl's butt. Not only did she strike him hard enough to give him a black eye but her much taller (and much stronger) fiancé threw him out of the bar, which was followed by thunderous applause.

"What the hell," The man slurred as he stumbled down the dark street. The incident at the bar had been passed around and no other place would allow him inside. This only made the man even more angry and dangerous.

"Hey," A sweet feminine voice called from behind the man called out. "Tell me, what's your name?"

The man turned in a very crooked fashion. He saw the girl's silhouette and smiled. She appeared to be in her early-thirties, tall, slender, and enough of a bust for him to get a good grab.

"Drew, I think," The man drooled as he approached the beautiful woman. She was much, much, more lovely up close; her black hair was bouncy and she oozed of his favorite scent in the world: fine alcohol. "What's your name, beautiful?"

The slender woman bent down and kissed the man's rough cheek. "Follow me into the ally and I'll tell you, and maybe you'll get something more."

Drew followed the beautiful woman straight into the ally. He was planning out his attack; maybe he would bash her over the head and drag the body out to his car. It couldn't have been parked too far away from where he was, right? Before he could make a reach for her, a second shadow appeared from the darkness. Like the girl, this figure was slender and was wearing a dark coat, but he could easily tell that this wasn't another young woman.

"What the hell is this crap," Drew yelled at the girl.

"Oh," She said in a teasing voice. "I thought it would be a lot more fun with him around."

"I don't roll that way!" Drew's voice grew louder. "Cut the crap right now; I only want you!"

"And what were you going to do to her, huh, Drew," The young man asked, slowly approaching the short man. In the light, it was clear that the young man's hair was pure white. His voice was also as smooth as the woman's. "You were going to knock her out, take her to your house and make her your helpless love slave, right? You are a pathetic excuse for a human being. I know everything that you were thinking and you absolutely sicken me. How's a small man like you suppose to even carry a woman her size to your car anyway?"

"Shut up!" Drew exclaimed at the young man. How he wished to teach this young one a swift lesson in respect.

Before anything could even happen, the tall woman was now behind Drew and swiftly snapped his neck. Drew was dead before his body could hit the floor.

"Good riddance," The young man muttered as he kicked the corpse. "Alexis, when's the old man supposed to get here?"

"You're the one who can read minds, Drake," The girl answered. "You tell me: Is he in the area?"

"I can't read his thoughts," Drake answered. Drake knew that Alexis was only teasing him. He was only able to read the minds of humans, nothing more.

"Well, I'm going to start dining without him, Alexis told him, giggling. "It was my kill after all."

Alexis slowly sat down on the gravel floor, not caring about dirtying her scarlet dress that was under her coat. She studied the dead body as if it were some kind of alien creature. Alexis couldn't believe she was once like Drew, a fragile being who could easily be manipulated.

Now, she was immortal.

Alexis was a vampire.

She was now the dominant being.

"What was this guy's problem anyway," Alexis asked Drake as she reached for Drew's limp arm.

"From what I could tell, this guy was 'celebrating' his divorce." Drake had a very rare power amongst vampires, but he was the only one who saw it as a curse. He had the ability to read anybody's mind, as long as he could see that person's face in his mind and they are a reasonable distance away from him. When it was time for him to hunt, Drake used his power to find out a person's insecurities and exploit them. He would know every single terrible thing that they were thinking at that time. It had to be done in order to not break Alexander's Code.

"I saw him when he walked inside the bar," Drake continued as Alexis sipped her O-negative. "He had the look of a scum bag, but I had no idea how bad this guy was. Cheating, raping, and he had a history of arrests for multiple domestic violence charges. I wanted to go in there and just take him out right where he sat. Last week, he got news that his HIV was now beginning to spread."

"So that's what I taste," Alexis added. She then stood up and pulled out a stack of blood bags. "Alexander won't mind if I started 'making inventory' now, would he?"

"Speak of the devil." Drake pointed down to the opening of the alleyway.

The figure that Drake was pointing at wasn't at all taller than them. He did stand with great pride, but it wasn't out of ignorance. He had lived over the span of one-hundred-and-fifty years he had earned the right to stand with so much pride.

"About time Alexander," Alexis said.

All three of them were wearing the matching dark leather coats, but the one referred to as Alexander was the only one who was wearing the hood over his face. He moved at lightning speed to where the dead body lied. His red eyes seemed to glow, taking in everything that happened. It was Drake who filled him in on how they caught their prey.

"Good work," was all that Alexander could say to them.

Alexander lived with a strict moral code. Even though he was a vampire, he still cared about the well fair of the human race. However, his vampire instinct to feast on the blood of humans to continue living his life was much more overpowering. For that reason, Alexander made a moral compromise with his instincts and his morals, swearing that he couldn't just kill anyone he wanted. Innocent blood was always much sweeter than the other kind of blood they could have obtained, the blood of those who made the world a terrible place to be, those who deserved to die.

When he transformed Drake into what he was, Drake agreed to follow the Code, at first. Alexander didn't share the same skill as Drake, so he couldn't have known about how terrible a human's mind can be. Slowly, Drake began to hate every human being on the planet, innocent or guilty.

"That's all the blood I can get from this guy," Alexis commented, placing the blood bags under her coat.

"Excellent," Alexander proclaimed, slowly walking out of the alley. "I'll use one of these cars to make it seem like it was all an accident."

Drake easily picked up Drew's corpse and followed his fearless leader. He watched as Alexander focused on a black suburban a few feet away from them and placed it in the middle of the street.

_Smash,_ Alexander though as he focused on the large car in front of him.

It was like an invisible hammer was pounding against the grill of the car. Drake dropped the body in front of the car while Alexis released two blood bags around the corpse. The only way a vampire can live peacefully was in secrecy. They needed it to look like his death was a simple accident of a night of heavy drinking that had gone horribly wrong. It was good that Alexander was able to manipulate things with only a single thought. In an instant, a wire snapped inside the car and caused a series of sparks. The car was no covered with amazing flames.

"That'll do it," Alexander told his followers.

At once, Drake and Alexis pulled their dark hoods over their heads. Although it wasn't the sun, the fire was enough to make their skin start to boil. Drake and Alexis followed their master down the alleyway, not wishing to be seen by any on looking spectators. Underneath each of their hoods, the only thing visible was a vampire's eyes. Bloody red irises shined straight through the darkness, and nothing more.

Chapter Two: Surprises

The pieces are still.

The storm is about to strike.

The knight makes first move.

The scorching summer weeks passed by quickly for Luis Medina. He was excited to have someone that he could actually refer to as a friend. Luis and Luna spent much of their vacation in the library and she was a big help in his enrollment to Montwood High School. For the first time at all that year, Luis wasn't wishing he could skip over the rest of his high school experience.

In mid-August, school began on a cloudy morning.

"Hurry your ass up, Luis," Ashley, Luis's sister, yelled from the outside of the bathroom door.

Two seconds later, the door opened, revealing a fully dressed Luis. He had no specific fashion or purposeful coordination when it came to appearance. His hair still seemed wet and messy, and exhaustion was flowing through his body.

"Why're you in such of a hurry anyway," Luis groaned as he passed by his sister. "You still have another week to go before your classes at the University start."

Ashley slammed the door in her brother's face without saying a word to him. Slightly annoyed, Luis returned to his room to finish up getting ready for his own classes. He was sitting down on his bed, which tempted him to want to lie back down and sleep the entire day away. The idea was quickly tossed out of his mind when Luis noticed exactly what time it was. Luna had informed him that it would be best for him to arrive about an hour before school officially started.

His father had already left for work, his mother was still asleep and his sister was occupied in the shower, leaving Luis feeling alone. Luis was used to not talking to anyone before he left to school, but he had gotten used to his new friend's caring attitude towards him.

Luis's walk to school wasn't too bad; August weather was indeed much nicer and much more enjoyable than it was in the middle of summer. To pass the time, he hummed along to the song that was currently playing on his iPod. Luis wasn't someone who would casually blast his music through his headphones. To him, listening to his music was a completely happy, private experience.

When Luis reached the school campus, he understood exactly why Luna warned him to come to school early. A complete sea of students crowded the outside of the school building, some of them acting more frantic than others. Luis knew that he didn't have too much to worry about because he had completed everything that needed to be done at pre-registration a few weeks before. The only thing that he needed to do was pick up his school schedule.

Luis broke through the crowd without too much effort. There were a few incidents where he almost tripped over someone else, but he would grab onto someone else's bag before he even hit the floor. After that, there was another large group of people he had to go by. After fifteen minutes of waiting, he finally was able to grab his senior schedule.

Before Luis could even breathe, he was met by a familiar, friendly face. Luna had attacked him from behind in a playful manor, acting like a child who wanted a piggy-back ride. The first thing Luis noticed was that Luna had now added pink highlights to her long hair. It would only be something that would work with her kind of attitude.

"When did you get those highlights," Luis asked as Luna climbed off of him.

She let out a small belly laugh. "Last night. It took me forever to convince my dad to let me get them."

"That's so cool," Luis commented, and he indeed meant it. Luna's free spirit was something Luis very much admired.

"I have a question for you," Luna said in a matter-of-fact sort of voice. "You've had my e-mail address and phone number for weeks now. Why haven't you tried to message me at all?"

Luis was frozen in shock. He had been a bit frightened to call her. To him, it just seemed a bit embarrassing, to call someone that he really liked. Every chance he got to call her, he chickened out at the last minute.

"Give me your phone," She told him in her playful, demanding voice.

Luis handed her his phone without hesitation. He was at least smart enough to have her number saved in the phone's memory, if that was what she was looking for. Luna searched the phone's data until she found her destination.

"Got it!" Luna exclaimed in a victorious tone.

What Luna was specifically looking for was Luis's phone number. With her light blue eyes, she stared at the ten-digit code and melded it into her own internal memory. Near perfect photographic memory was something Luna gratefully inherited from her mother.

Luna Estrella was the middle child of her family, being the younger sister of the Star Brothers, twins who played on the school's varsity football team the previous year. Both of them were also enrolled at the local University with football scholarships. For the past three years, she had been known mostly as Rick and Phil's younger sister.

Although her family was very athletic oriented, Luna could very much care less about sports or activities of those kind. Even her younger sister, Kira, was slowly being transformed into a sports fanatic. In reality, Luna was more of an artistic kind of person, although her body type portrayed her more like a tennis player.

Because of this, Luna and the rest of her family didn't always see eye-to-eye on most things. Neither her mother nor father believed art was something someone could really be successful at, no matter what. It took a bit of convincing (and begging) for them to allow Luna not to play sports at all during her high school years. She didn't want to waste her time working on the field, she wanted to have fun and enjoy some normal human experiences. Sports just didn't interest her as much as art, music, and theater.

Even in her walk, it was very obvious that Luna was care-free kind of girl. She was seventeen years old, but had the spirit of a young, innocent child. Such a notion didn't mix well with her fellow peers however, making her an outcast by most of the student body. That didn't matter to Luis though. To him, Luna was a huge breath of fresh air.

The vampire's hideout wasn't some kind of hidden castle carved deep into a mountain side or was something that was cut off from the rest of society. On the contrary, Alexander believed that the best hiding spot to sustain his lifestyle was in plain sight, in one of the hottest places in the world. No one would really expect a vampire to live somewhere it was sunny almost all year round. It was the perfect hiding spot.

Dark curtains covered the windows of the studio apartment which were illuminated by soft, florescent lights. The sun was their natural enemy -- get caught in the sun for too long and a vampire's skin begins to burst into flames and leaves behind only dust and ash. Cremation was the only permanent way to kill off a vampire. Cutting off their limbs wouldn't help whatsoever; the limbs would mealy reanimate themselves and move on their own accord until they were reattached to the owner.

It was lucky that the trio were the only ones who resided in the entire building. Alexander, who acquired much wealth under different aliases, bought up every single room in the entire complex. The whole building smelt of old, rotting blood and severed human limbs. If a human being were to even move into the building, they would most likely call the proper authorities and the vampires were either doomed or had to move.

Since vampires didn't have the need to sleep anymore, Alexis occupied her day time by watching the small television that was in one of the rooms on the top floor. Before the three of them officially moved in, Drake had cable installed inside the building to keep an eye on the news of the outside world. It took Alexis no time to take over the television though. She truly was the newest member of their "family".

Drake, seemingly slightly frustrated, snatched the remote from Alexis's hand and changed it from a daytime soap opera and to the news.

"Hey; I was watching something," Alexis complained.

"You'll get over it," Drake informed her.

In protest, Alexis left the room as Drake kept his focus on the local news station. The headline at the bottom was clear, written in bold, flashy font. SOLO IS FOUND NOT GUILTY FOR THE DEATH OF DAUGHTER-IN-LAW. A small smile appeared on Drake's face and his tongue licked one of his fangs.

"Antonio Solo, accused of murdering his son's wife, as well as the two children she bore, has been found not guilty this morning by a jury of his peers. Many say that much is to blame on the prosecution, focusing more on attacking Solo's character without acquiring sufficient evidence of his guilt. People are paying credit to his defense attorney..."

While the female reporter commented on the story that was currently unfolding, footage from outside of the court house appeared on the television screen. Antonio Solo, a pudgy man who looked as if he was homeless, was surrounded by people holding up cameras and microphones to get a statement. He and his lawyer were being led by four security guards, leading him to a limousine down the road.

Drake could tell by the look in Solo's eyes that he was absolutely guilty, without a shadow of a doubt. His crime made him the perfect target for the next feeding attack. Of course, if Solo did die the day of his not-guilty verdict, there may be an investigation by various authorities. _The lawyer_ , Drake thought as he zoomed closely to the screen. He was a clean cut man who chose to defend this scum of the earth and ended up winning the case. This man has no right to be alive in Drake's eyes!

"Find Alexander," Drake called out to Alexis. "Tell him I found our next target."

"I don't know where he is," She yelled back, taking a drink from her blood bag. "I'm not sure if he came back before sunrise. Do you think he was with her?"

"No way," Drake answered, slightly frustrated. "Why the hell would he want to go visit her after _she_ left us?"

Returning to school was an amazing experience for young Luna Estrella. After introducing Luis to her two friends, she felt a small sense of pride within herself. Ever since she first saw Luis in the public library, she had an ingrown instinct to help him out.

It was her final period of the day, Pre-Calculus, and she was sharing it with Luis. She walked into the classroom, noticing that Luis was already sitting in one of the seats in the front row. The classroom was a dimly lit portable placed a while away from the main school building, and it was also incredibly warm at this time of day. All Luna cared about was to not fall asleep in the middle of the class. As she took a seat to the right of Luis, the bell loudly rang, signaling the start of the final class period.

"Welcome," said a tall, red haired woman who was wearing large glasses on her face and looked like she was dressed in a lab coat. Even if the students were standing, it seemed that the teacher would tower over all of them. "My name is Ms. Ramirez, your Pre-Calculus teacher for the year. I welcome my students to ask me for help when they need it; there is no such thing as a stupid question; especially in a class this difficult. I stay much later than most other teachers, so that means we have all the time in the world to talk if you're ever struggling in this class. Will you two," she said, pointing at Luis and Luna, "please hand out the syllabus to each student?"

"Yes, ma'am," They both answered, standing up in unison.

"Thank you, Ms. Estrella," Ramirez whispered.

After pacing around the front of the room, passing out stacks of paper in each row, Ms. Ramirez began with her lesson. Being the first day of class and being the final period, most of the students paid very little attention to what was going on. Some students played with their phones while others simply decided to take a nap in the middle of class. Even Luis wasn't interested in the first day's lesson, so he began whispering to Luna behind her teacher's back.

"She knows you," He whispered in a curious voice.

"She's an old, family friend," Luna replied. "She knows my dad, which is the reason why I'm in this class in the first place."

"Did they use to date or something," Luis asked.

Luna began to snicker at the notion. It took all of her energy to not burst out into loud laughter. "No, it was nothing like that. They went to school together, and they were friends. There's no way that they'd be like that."

His curiosity peaked; Luis didn't ask Luna another word about their relationship. She didn't really feel like going into detail about her relationship was with Ms. Ramirez, especially to Luis. Luna cared about Luis very much, which is why she kept certain aspects of her life a secret. There were some things that no one was allowed to know about.

When Luna got home after finishing school, her head was slightly pounding. Although it was just the first day, some teachers insisted on giving their students homework. One of these classes happened to be Literature, where she had to read through and attempt to comprehend the first few pages of _Brave New World_. It wasn't starting out as good of an afternoon as she had hoped.

"Welcome home, Luna," her mother, Emily Estrella said. "You're father needs to talk to you about something."

"Alright," Luna said, crossing across the living room and into her father's office.

Luna never had to question her mother when she said that her dad needed to talk to her about anything. There was always only one thing that he would ever want to talk with her about. She honestly couldn't remember the last time that she had an actual serious one-on-one conversation with her dad that wasn't about their family responsibility. Luna was deathly afraid of her father.

Victor Estrella was a tall muscular man with bright red hair and dark brown eyes. Luna's twin brothers could be simply seen as perfect clones of this man, and carried out the same kind of intimidation wherever any of them went. He was sitting in his large, leather chair, facing his small television screen.

All Luna had to do was read the headline and could figure out the rest without either her or her father saying another word. SOLO FOUND NOT GUILTY! WHOLE WORLD SHOCKED!! The Antonio Solo case was a local investigation that caught the attention of virtually everybody in the entire world. Everybody could tell that Antonio Solo was truly guilty of the murders from the very beginning of the trial. However, faulty evidence, lack of warrants, and a bit of hate speech made by the prosecution had created enough reasonable doubt in the jurors' minds to find him not guilty in the court of law. Luna knew something that Antonio Solo didn't know though. She knew that there were some people in El Paso who could punish him without the interference of criminal justice.

"Do you think the vampires are going to go after him," Luna asked to break the silence with her father.

"Alexander's not that foolish to do it now," Victor told his daughter, still focusing on the television. "Solo's going to be a pretty protected person for a while, so there's no way that they would be able to get to him, especially tonight. Still, something doesn't feel quite right. I've noticed it in the air -- something's changing, and soon."

Luna had felt it too; something was telling her from the inside of her body to be extra cautious and take light steps everywhere she goes for now on. It was an instinct that she had inherited from her father, and had grown to trust it whenever she felt it. The first time she ever felt this feeling was when she was thirteen years old and she met a man named Alexander with two other followers, who introduced themselves as vampires. That was when her abilities were beginning to blossom inside of her, and she has now learned how to channel them properly.

Luna was a werewolf, and it was her job to make sure that vampires were kept in line. It was all political between vampires, werewolves, and spell casters. Luna's father was a strong werewolf who passed down his ability to all of his offspring. Emily was a very gifted spell caster, and it appeared that Luna was the only one in the family to have acquired her mother's unique powers.

"So, what do we do now," Luna asked her father.

"The only thing we can do is sit and wait," he answered in an anxious voice. "Alexander's clan needs to feed soon. As long as they're still sticking with that Code of theirs, we have nothing to worry about. They haven't messed up and gotten noticed so far."

While Victor didn't think that it was okay to kill another creature to reach one's own greedy needs, he also knew that vampires had to feed on a human's blood in order to stay alive. Vampires also had their own reasons to live as well; no one would stay alive just to stay bored for the rest of their existence. With Alexander's Code, Victor saw it a bit differently than the vampires did. He saw it as taking one person's wasted life to help someone else extend theirs. Victor and Alexander were mutual men, and met every month, to see that both sides were in check.

"Oh, dad; whose patrolling the city tonight," Luna asked as she slowly walked out of her father's office.

"Phil and Rick are going to be taking over for a while," he answered, still keeping his focus on the television. "They have a lot of time on their hands now, and it'll be easier for them now that they're in college rather than in high school."

Luna left her father's office on that note. The last thing she wanted to do was get into another long winded discussion on her brothers. She did not feel like transforming into her wolf form tonight anyway, although she that the werewolves in this generation resembled large coyotes than actual wolves.

Luna collapsed on her bed as she walked into her room. She didn't really feel like doing anything tonight, especially useless homework. Her backpack was thrown into an empty corner away from her bed, and that's how it was going to stay until tomorrow morning. Although she did feel exhausted, those with werewolf blood running through their veins no longer needed the reason to sleep. Luna had figured that this was because a werewolf needed to stay up late into the night to keep an eye on vampires, back when there was more of a racial difference than a political one. Luna reached for her cellphone and noticed that there was one missed message in her inbox. She opened the letter and was slightly surprised to see the name of the sender.

"Luis!" Luna gasped.

She read through the short message he had sent her. _"Hey Luna. This may sound really stupid, but I was wondering if you wanted to go out on a date with me tomorrow night?"_ Luna had to read it over several times to make sure this was real. Her afternoon had suddenly been salvaged.

Chapter Three: Feelings

Leaves begin to change.

Darkness falls across the land.

Emotions rise high.

The sun was about to rise on this now mid-September morning. In the dull darkness, something that resembled a lightly brown furred dog was running as fast as it possibly could. The wind flowed freely through the young creature's fur as it ran towards its predetermined destination. Before the sun was able to rise above the horizon, to let out the smallest glimmer of light, the large coyote was able to make its way to the backyard of a white, two story house, not even needing to pant or catch its breath.

With the last bit of darkness, the creature seemed to be transforming into something completely different. In a matter of just a few seconds, a young, naked girl was standing up, reaching for the bathrobe that she had placed there earlier in the night. Luna had run city patrol alone this night, seeing mainly what Antonio Solo was up to these days. She knew that he was the lowest of scum a human being can be, and she couldn't wait for the vampires to just attack him and get it over with.

Waiting by the sliding door was Luna's mother, wearing teal pajamas and holding a warm mug of green tea. She sipped her tea as her daughter quickly got into the house. Luna entered the laundry room, frantically trying to pick out fresh clothes to wear for the day. It was now the weekend, but she was acting as if it were the middle of a school week.

"Is everything okay, mom," Luna asked as she made her way to the fridge.

"Just making sure that you're not over doing anything," Emily said in a concerned voice. "Your dad thinks that just because your brothers Rick and Phil were able to do this kind of stuff when they were your age that you are able to do it as well. He doesn't quite understand that you're a young woman now, and not to mention a spell caster, who hasn't had as much time at studying that part of her abilities as well."

"I'm fine mom, really," Luna urged while pouring herself a small glass of orange juice. "I like patrolling the city at night by myself anyway. It gives me a lot of time to myself where I can just think about stuff."

These kinds of conversations between Luna and her mother happened regularly ever since Luna started her last year of high school. Luna just figured that her mother was scared that she was going to lose her daughter and she just wanted to hold on to her "little girl" for a while longer. Luna wouldn't be leaving El Paso for some time though, that's for sure.

"Alright," Emily told her daughter, now wanting to change the subject. "So, how's that boy you just can't stop talking about -- what's his name again?"

"Luis," Luna said with a half-laugh. "He's fine. I think I've almost got that kid out of his little shell. He's completely terrified of the outside world. Ha-ha."

Luna had a small number of boyfriends in the past, but no one seemed to want to stay with her for too long. Sometimes, they thought that Luna was just too out there for them to handle. Other times, they caught a glimpse of her brother (or worse, her father) and ran for the hills without looking back. Usually, they were dared to ask her out on a date, which seemed to stop hurting her feelings after the first few times it happened.

Luis was very different from all those other boys. Maybe it was simply due to the fact that the two of them developed a friendship with each other and had their feelings develop from there. It seemed like Luis wasn't too much into anime or some of the other things she was madly interested in, but Luis at least listed to what she had to say and seemed interested in learning about all of Luna's favorite things. He liked how weird Luna was, so that made Luna feel more comfortable with herself around him.

"So, has he kissed you yet," Emily asked, smiling at her daughter.

"MOM!" Luna exclaimed in an appalling voice. "That is none of your business!"

"I'm guessing that's a 'no'." Emily thought out loud.

It wasn't Luna's fault that Luis seemed too timid to even hold her hand most of the time. Their first date was at the movies, and whenever their fingers touched in the popcorn box, Luis's entire arm would go into a sudden spasm. Ever since then, they would meet a lot in the library, mostly for working for school and studying. Nothing special ever happened in their relationship since the date at the movies, but it was very obvious that the two of them had feelings for each other.

"He's, er...a bit difficult." Luna answered to her mother.

"As are you," Emily smartly returned. "Why don't you make the first move instead of him? There's no rule book out there that says you can't. He who strikes first wins, right?"

Luna gave her mother an evil glare, signaling that Emily had once again won the conversation. She slammed down the rest of her juice and climbed upstairs to get ready. Today, she was going to be meeting Luis again.

It was now noon and Luis was starting to panic. Every few seconds, he would walk to the front door, hoping for the doorbell to ring just as he passed by it. Luna wasn't supposed to arrive for another half-hour, but he couldn't control his patience. Besides a few blind dates that were set up by his parents and their buddies from work, Luna was Luis's first real girlfriend. He at least hoped that she was his girlfriend -- he wasn't quite sure what the criteria you had to meet in order to say that you are exclusively dating somebody.

"Mom says for you to calm the hell down or you're going to have an aneurysm," Ashley said, grabbing a soda from the fridge.

"Please, Ashley, just stay out of my hair today," Luis groaned, collapsing his body onto the living room couch.

"Not on your life, kid; there's no way I'm going to be missing the show." Ashley let out a squeal of a laugh. "Plus, I'm interested in seeing what kind of a girl you have coming over. How out there did you have to go to find someone who would actually want to go out with you anyway?"

"GET OUT OF HERE NOW!" Luis barked!

The doorbell chimed, causing Luis to jump into the air, his stomach now in knots. He got off the couch and hurried to answer the door. He allowed a sigh of relief when he saw no one else was opening the door. He leveled his breathing and opened up the door for Luna.

"You're early," Luis said, his eyes fixated on Luna's lovely smile.

"Mom had some stuff she needed to do in town today, so she just decided to drop me off a bit early," Luna answered.

"You don't have a car," Luis asked in a curious tone, welcoming her inside.

"No, I, er, failed the test three times." She let off a small laugh and began to blush.

Luis was a bit surprised to what Luna had said. Although he was walking mostly everywhere, it was only because all the places that he wanted to go to were in walking distance. He had acquired his driver's license before they had left Los Angeles but didn't have much practice since they moved to El Paso. It was good to have it, in case there was some kind of emergency that called for it. He escorted Luna to the living room, where an array of junk food was spread out and a number of DVD's lied scatted on the table. This had been a weekend that Luis had been dreaming of for a while, and he wanted it to be just right.

Alexander was going over the preparations throughout his mind over and over again, playing it back in his head like it was a movie. If every detail wasn't perfectly planned out and in place, then everything he had been working on for the past few weeks would have been absolutely for nothing. He wasn't going to risk being killed because of a serial murderer.

He even hat to "recruit" a new member of his family in order to make sure that they had enough members to make sure that everything would be done perfectly. On days like today, he would sit alone in his dark room, avoiding any and all distractions.

Somewhere else in the vampire's hideout, Drake was coming up with his own little plan. He had grown far too tired of playing Alexander's little minion, pretended to understand what he stood for. Drake had known, even when he was human, that he was a natural born leader. His trust in Alexander's leadership and grown far too thin for him to follow anymore.

_He couldn't possibly keep this going_ , Drake thought in his room. He had to know that one day Alexander was going to hit a brick wall. _Sorry Alexander, but -- no, wait. I am not sorry, Alexander. You were weak, believing that this little noble act could go on forever. You protected these scum human beings, so that makes you just as guilty as well. You have to go away!_

There was a knock at his door, Alexis entering through the doorway without waiting for Drake's approval. Drake didn't mind at all though; in fact, it seemed like perfect timing. He needed to make sure that she would be a good companion to him, or if she would have to be killed like he would Alexander. Thus far, his findings were very inconclusive. She wasn't as straight forward as Drake had hoped she'd be. It wasn't exactly Alexis that he wanted to have, but it was her strength and abilities that made her valuable.

"What is it, Alexis," Drake asked in a relaxed voice

"She's woken up," Alexis said, her voice sounding eager. She seemed to be like a kid ready to open her presents on Christmas morning.

When a human being is bitten by a vampire, and is, medically speaking, still alive, their body shuts down completely for a short while. The time varies from person to person. In that time, their entire body goes through a series of transformations. As long as there is at least a pint of original blood in the human's system, they will, in the end, become a vampire. It was Drake who drew the new girl in, just as he had done when he transformed Alexis into what he was.

As the two of them walked over to the room where their new addition had been sleeping, Drake was scheming. There was only one way he was going to discover whether or not Alexis would be to be loyal to him or Alexander.

"Drake, what are you doing?"

Drake was pinning Alexis against the solid wall, staring intensely into her glowing red eyes. He wanted this to be as convincing as possible; it had to work the first time or not at all. Their bodies were forced against each other, one of Drake's hands placed over Alexis's cold cheek.

Well, in this form, at least she's cute.

Drake pressed his lips against hers for a mere second. Alexis felt as if she were sucked into a marvelous euphoria, almost as if she was able to walk into the direct sunlight without the fear of her existence coming to an end. She had feared an end to this kiss with Drake -- it was the only thing that felt real to her at that moment. All Drake could think about was the bloody taste of Alexis's lips: cancerous.

"That was...unexpected," Alexis said, shyly. This was a time where Alexis hoped she could blush.

"Let's go," Drake told her. "We have to make sure the new girl doesn't do anything stupid like open the blinds."

Now much later into the afternoon, Luna was growing very impatient with Luis. It was obvious that he really did like her in a romantic way and she was trying her best to make as many advances as she could on him. Luis seemed to like her so much, that he was obviously afraid that he would do or say something so stupid that she would break up with him before the end of the day. Luna, when she was with Luis, felt (for lack of a better word) human. It was a great kind of feeling and she didn't want to let him go.

In the dully lit room, Luna's phone suddenly went off on the couch. Inside the room's atmosphere, it was quiet, causing the two of them to jump. After both of their hearts skipped a few beats, Luna made her way to the phone. Her eyes widened at the caller ID. Her father would rarely call her for anything.

"Where are you," Victor immediately asked his daughter.

"I'm at a friend's house," She answered quickly. "Mom dropped me off earlier today, remember? What's going on, dad?"

"Your mother is on her way right now to get you. Be ready for her when she gets there so she doesn't have to wait for you." His voice was stern; trying to get Luna to understand what was going on.

"But, dad, I--"

"Do what I say, LUNA!"

The phone line suddenly went dead. Luna slammed her phone shut and swore under her breath.

"What's going on," Luis asked as he slowly approached her with a puzzled look on his face. He was afraid that Luna wasn't allowed to be with him anymore.

Just simply be seeing how worried Luis was, Luna was able to calm down almost instantaneously. She was frustrated mostly because her father wasn't trying to explain what was going on. She knew that it had something to do with the abnormal half of her life, the piece of her life that none of her friends knew anything about. Maybe a vampire just suddenly went bad, meaning that they would have to exterminate them before they could do any more harm. The bad feeling in the pit of Luna's stomach had suddenly returned.

"Everything's fine," Luna answered in an uneven voice. She hugged him, clutching onto his shoulders. "There's an emergency with my parents, so I'll have to leave soon. Thank you Luis for a wonderful day; I really enjoyed myself."

"But, all we did was just watch movies and eat cold pizza. I feel kind of stupid; I didn't say a lot to you today." Luna didn't like the tone Luis was taking.

"Ha-ha, silly boy. I had a wonderful time with you, even if you think we really did nothing." Part of her wished that she could do something like this with him every day.

"I had a wonderful day, too." He tightened around her waist, seemingly happier.

"I'm glad, Luis." She pulled away from the hug.

Luna acted without thinking once again. Before she knew it, she was kissing Luis, whose breath tasted of cold pepperoni pizza, buttered popcorn, and an array of sodas. The odd taste didn't matter to Luna though. Nothing else seemed to exist for that moment. There was no vampires, no werewolves, and no more secrets to hide.

No other words were uttered between them.

Chapter Four: Attack

Twilight is now gone.

When the dawn breaks over them,

a new Sun will rise

The high that Luna as on from kissing Luis slowly melted away as Luna got back to her house. No one seemed to want to explain anything to her about why she was forced to leave so early. Being in the dark was not a fun past time for young Luna Estrella. Her temper seemed to be growing by the passing seconds. She wished that she was back at Luis's place, continuing their mindless fun.

An hour passed by slowly for the Estrella clan. Everyone was off doing their own thing inside the large house. It didn't seem like anybody but Victor understood what exactly was going on. It made everyone in the house feel uneasy, but there was no way to make Victor talk if he didn't want to.

There was a sudden knock at the door, which surprised almost everybody in the house. Victor was the only one who got up and walked towards the door.

"We welcome you inside our house," Luna heard her father say in a slow tone.

From the threshold, four hooded figures appeared in front of the Estrella family. From the four of them, Alexander was the first to remove his covering, his long black hair falling to his sides. This was the first time that Luna had seen Alexander's bald head, causing her to feel on edge.

"Good evening, Alexander," Victor said, breaking the uncomfortable silence that was lingering in the cold air.

"The same we give to you, Victor," Alexander returned. "As you can clearly see, there is a reason why I called for us to visit your family."

Alexander's arm gestured to the shortest person in their group. Her body appeared to be shaking, Luna guessing that it was out of fear. In the old days, vampires and werewolves were mortal (and immortal) enemies. Maybe the girl believed that things were like the old days, instead of the civil tolerance of today.

"Might I ask what happened to Erika," Emily chimed in from the kitchen.

"She left us a long time ago, but I hear that she still resides within the city limits," Alexis said, taking off her own hood. Drake silently followed suit, seemingly staring off into space.

"We recently had to recruit a new member of our 'family' in order for us to succeed in our latest task," Alexander began to explain. "We're going to go after Antonio Solo tonight, and we need another young woman to draw him to us. We took out his lawyer a while ago, if you remember the news reports, but we fear that someone may have spotted Alexis and may be on guard if they see her around Solo. Also, our new friend has a very unique power that will prove most useful for our cause."

"Power," Luna asked.

"It's okay," Drake whispered into the girl's ear, "you can show it to them."

Drake gestured to the small girl to remove her dark hood. Her face seemed to be a bit older than Luna's, but not by too much. Her hair was a light blue, and her eyes were bloody red, just like every vampire that she had laid eyes on. The two girls met perfectly eye to eye in a single moment, and the vampire was whispering something quickly under her breath.

Suddenly, the door burst open with a loud bang! Running into the living room, seemingly out of breath, was a tattered Luis, with his left hand hidden behind his back. He looked as if he had been crying ever since she left his house. No one was making a move towards him. They seemed very distant from the situation, as if they were only observing.

"Luis, what's wrong," Luna asked, attempting to calm him down.

"Stay away from me," Luis ordered her.

Luis then lifted up his left hand from behind his back, revealing a small handgun. He pulled the trigger seven times, aiming at everybody around him, leaving only Luna standing. He then pointed it right at Luna's heart.

"What the hell are you doing," Luna cried out. She fell to her knees, ready to beg for her life.

" _Monster_ ," Luis growled at the young girl. "I know what you are! You are a beast! A demon creature straight out of Hell! I'm going to send you back right to where you came from!"

Luna reached for Luis's gun without thinking. She ran towards Luis before he could pull the trigger again. The two of them struggled as Luna tried to knock the gun out of his hands. Luna did her best not to abuse the fact that she was created much stranger than he would ever be. She needed to stop him at any costs. No one else needed to die tonight.

Crash!

The two of them flung their bodies out of the living room window. Luna examined herself, seeing that she had only suffered a few slight cuts and bruises. She then looked over at Luis, who wasn't as fortunate as Luna. He had stopped moving his body completely; a large piece of glass had slit into his throat, leaving a large gash in his neck where blood poured out of his body. The crimson leaked everywhere and Luis's breathing had completely ceased. There was only so much of the image that Luna was willing to take.

" _That's enough_ ," Luna heard her father yell.

Suddenly, everything around her had changed. Everything had turned completely back to normal. Luna wasn't over Luis's dead body, but lying on the living room couch. Everything was back to the way it was before Luis had come in. There was no broken glass, her clothes weren't torn and covered in blood, and no one appeared to be shot or injured in any way. Luna felt that what she saw was real, it just had to be. She saw Luis's body in the broken glass, but the house was completely free of his presence.

"Where is he," Luna cried out, reaching for her mother. "I was bleeding, and everybody was killed, a-and--!"

"Luna, darling, please calm down," Emily said holding her daughter closely in her arms. Luna was crying into her mother's warm shoulder. "What did you do to her?" Emily's anger was directed more at Drake, the one who ordered the girl around rather than the young vampire herself.

"What we showed you was Karin's power," Drake said, placing his hand on the blue hair girl's head. "She creates illusions in someone's head, rendering them completely useless. It seems to work on you werewolves as well as anyone else. There is something strange about Karin's ability though."

"What's so strange about her," Victor asked in a sarcastic tone.

"Well, you understand that I can read everyone's thoughts except for vampires," Drake began in a straight voice. "Well, with Karin, I can't read the mind of the person that she chooses to use her powers on. I find this very...irritating."

Luna could tell that Drake wasn't in a secure place about the side effect to Karin's special power. Karin was afraid to face Drake and she was too timid to even look Luna in the eye again. Still, she just wanted to say something, to let her voice be heard at least a little bit.

"How long do I have to be like this," Karin finally asked. "Alexis, you told me I could be a teenager again. That's why I'm helping you guys in the first place."

Luna understood a little bit of what Karin was asking the other female vampire. It's an ability that vampires can easily master, the power to become any age they can chose to be. The catch was that they had to have actually lived that age before they became a vampire. From the look of it, Luna believed that Karin could choose between any times from infancy to her early twenties.it was the perfect camouflage for any vampire who chose to stay in one place for any given amount of time.

"We've already explained this to you," Alexis groaned. "You first need to feed to have enough energy to make such a drastic change. Be patient – your current age is exactly what we need to draw our prey out."

"I'm not going to let some random guy rape me so you guys can do your little 'Superman Vampire' crap!" Karin complained.

"He'll never get that far," Alexander assured her. "Keep your eyes on the news, Victor. We'll do our best not to fail tonight."

"You haven't done so before," Victor roughly said.

With that, the vampires pulled their hoods back onto their heads and followed Alexander out of the house. Luna knew that there would be no patrolling for anyone tonight. Not even her father would go out into the town. Unfortunately, the dark feeling inside of Luna's stomach still lingered in the air, making her feel completely uneasy.

It was almost midnight, meaning every bar down the entire street was up and alive. Inside each bar, drunken people toppled over one another as they attempted to fill their greedy fixations. In the corner of a small country bar, Antonio Solo was drinking the finest whisky in the house. He was in great thanks to his now-late attorney, who helped him get set for life with the right counter-suits.

No one dared to even go near Solo anymore for any reason. Even the bartender would avoid any contact with him if he could. Solo knew exactly why everyone intentionally avoided him, but he honestly didn't give one damn about what other people thought. The verdict of not-guilty was final and he was free to do absolutely what he pleased.

"Why hello there," Solo slurred to the young lady closest to him once he was drunk enough to let his spirit run free. "What's your name, doll?"

"Karin," the blue haired girl said while downing two tequila shots. The clothes that Karin was wearing were small and tight; Antonio wasn't quite sure what to stare at first. She was a babe of the finest class in his view point. "I'm new here," She told him in a coy voice. "Would you mind helping me to my car? I'm a bit... (hiccup) drunk."

Outside, in a nearby alleyway, Drake, Alexis, and Alexander quietly awaited Karin's return. Drake, listening in on Solo's thoughts, was starting to reach his limit on what he was willing to take with his current prey. He not only wanted to exterminate Solo tonight, but Alexander as well, but he wasn't able to find the right moment to make his attack. Alexander was always on his guard, so a quick attack would probably cause more damage to Drake than anything else.

"Uh-oh," Drake had said aloud.

"What is it," Alexander asked.

Drake thought quickly. He had felt so stupid for not seeing it before; it was quite obvious to him now. An opening was now found. _Thank you Karin_ , Drake thought as he smiled. _I knew it would be a good idea to add you to my collection._

Solo's thoughts had completely disappeared from the bar. That had to mean that he was now under Karin's special spell. This had been a part of the plan until the very last minute, when they felt that it was too dangerous for her movements to be unknown for her first mission. Drake assumed it was a lapse in judgment that Karin was experiencing, and it worked out to his advantage. Now, he just needed it to work just right.

"Stupid bitch," Drake groaned.

"What the hell's going on in there Drake," Alexis asked in a shrill voice.

"She's going to take him through the back instead of taking him out of the front and leading him here. Alexander, follow me, we'll cut them off. Alexis – you wait here just in case if Karin does decide to revert back to the original plan."

He kissed Alexis softly; ensuring that she wouldn't disobey him and leave the spot, no matter what she heard going on the other side. He knew that the most effective way to get rid of Alexander was to do it all by himself. The dominos inside his mind were all collapsing much too quickly and easily.

Once the two of them were out of Alexis's sight and behind the building, Drake signaled for Alexander to wait by the back door. The smile on his face was growing as he saw Alexander crouch down and be focused only on the door. Drake placed his hand on the inside of his dark coat, reaching for the small blade that he kept on his person ever since he thought of ending Alexander's existence.

It all happened in a very swift movement. It was Drake's only chance of attacking Alexander! Unfortunately for him, he didn't cut quite deep enough to render him immobile; only just slightly cutting into Alexander's throat. For a vampire, this was only a minor inconvenience. Alexander, in shock, fell to his knees, trying to take in the entire situation.

Drake didn't hesitate to go in for a second attack. Alexander knew to dodge his next attack, but the movement was much too sloppy. Because of this, some of his arm had been cut open. For a human being, this would be the point at where they would just cease movement and just try to die as peacefully as possible.

"Stop this, Drake," Alexander cried out.

"You've always been weak in my eyes," Drake said to Alexander in a monotone voice. "You don't even have enough blood in you to fix yourself up, let alone give me a fair and proper fight. This is what you deserve, Alexander, for protecting those disgusting humans. This is what you do deserve, you know this to be true, and I'm glad to be the one who teaches you this lesson."

"I did this to protect us, Drake," Alexander pleaded. What he needed right now is every bit of time that he could get. "How else are we supposed to live in this world? If we just turned into mindless killers, then the werewolves would have taken out each and every one of us!"

"Ha!" Drake scoffed. "We have always been the stronger being. We have every right to take what is rightfully ours. Your time for sensibility is over. We're living in the _real_ world, so let's stop acting like something that we are not!"

Drake pushed his whole force into delivering one final, deadly blow. It would've worked if Alexander hadn't done exactly the same. The both of them had launched everything at each other, and Alexander felt lucky that he didn't get cut this time around. In Drake's confusion, Alexander stumbled away and into the city. He needed to disappear, to some place where he could hide from Drake.

On the other side, Antonio Solo was in an utter complete daze as he was walking out of the bar, following carefully behind Karin. She wasn't exactly too happy about being this close to Solo, knowing about his past. She remembered exactly how this man had become a public name only a few months ago. She had to remind herself over and over again that Solo wasn't in any state of mind where he could do any kind of harm to her. Even with the fact that she was vampire into play, she wasn't quite sure if she was completely safe.

"You're such a tease," Solo laughed in a goofy voice.

In his mind, it was like he had reached the peak of Nirvana. Karin, for one thing, was much bustier in the theater of his mind than in reality. He felt the fake Karin's hand touch him everywhere. Now, the Karin in his mind was taking off her top, having him completely lust over her.

_This better be worth it_ , Karin thought. Even if it all wasn't real, she still felt very unclean about doing such a thing in front of a known serial killer.

With Karin's special power, everything was a complete illusion to those who fell under it, almost as if they were dreaming while they were clearly awake. Karin was in control of their entire world, but had no control over the person entirely. She learnt that with her encounter with the werewolf, Luna. All she thought was "the person you care for the most comes to kill you and you end up dead". Obviously, Luna's free will broke though some of her spell and allowed her to fight the dream being. She knew that Solo wasn't quite as smart as the werewolf.

She slowly walked her prey into the dark alleyway, surprised to only find Alexis in their hideout. Confused, Karin had lost concentration and complete control over her power, releasing Solo from his trance. Instead of the bright lights of a florescent bathroom, he had awakened in the middle of the dark ally.

Before anyone could react to the situation, Drake broke through the two of the female vampires as fast as he could. With his blade, he stabbed Solo right through his gut. The shock of what all was going on around him caused Solo to enter Cardiac Arrest. Solo had died before he could even collapse to his knees.

Chapter Five: Memories

Heartless dreams within,

For midsummer nights have passed.

The fates play goes on.

It is said that werewolves could go on for almost a full year without having the need to rest. It wasn't the healthiest of lifestyles, but it was indeed possible to accomplish. In the Estrella family however, they usually used one night out of a week to catch up on their sleep. This idea was inspired mostly be Emily than by Victor.

On this very early October morning, Luna refused to sleep for almost a complete month now. The last time she tried to go to sleep, the nightmare had occurred.

In her dream, Luna was wearing only a velvet silk nightgown and was walking along an abandoned road in a forest that she had never visited before in her life. At times, she would attempt to simply transform into her werewolf form, but was oddly unable to do so. When that failed, she attempted to cast some of the simple defensive spells she had known, but her powers were extinguished. Nothing made sure that she was secure. Everything that made her a supernatural being had left her powerless.

Her insecurities exposed, she unconsciously traveled down the road, mostly hoping that it would lead her to an easy way out. Sometimes, there would be the sound of a twig breaking, which caused her to jump. She wasn't that much of a physical fighter when it came to her human form. Yes, she would be able to fight off any predator, but only enough to attempt running away from them, and only if it were a human being, she knew she would most likely be able to get away from.

Towards the end of the road, Luna began hearing a voice. It didn't belong to anybody that she could recall to memory. The voice was feminine and very ghostly. The strangest thing about it was that the voice wasn't calling out to her into the open air, but right into her brain. As the voice spoke to her, her body began to move much more quickly.

" _Luna, there is nothing that you can do to change what is to happen. Death is an equal force for every living creature. You enemies will die as well as those who are the most important to you. Keeping them close will only cause them harm and lead them to a much premature death. There is no way a girl as small as you can save them from the Reaper and his list. And when it is your time to die, you will have no one left beside you to witness your passing. You will die absolutely alone. There is nothing that makes you special enough to escape this inevitable fate."_

Luna was on the verge of tears, wishing the voice would go away. _Shut up_ , Luna thought as a few stray tears exited her eyes. She wanted to lash out verbally at the voice, but that was completely useless. Not a single noise would exit her mouth.

She walked a while longer, and finally noticed a small glimmer of light. Unable to run due to a supernatural restriction, she walked as fast as she could. It didn't matter to her what was waiting for her on the other side, but she just wanted to get away from here as quickly as possible. The light grew brighter passed the trees, and as it became nearly blinding, it felt like some force was holding her back. With all of her strength, Luna was determined to pass through what was every holding her back from passing through the light.

Luna was blind only for a single moment. When the light passed, Luna was slowly becoming very able to see her surroundings. It wasn't a bright day as the light had made her expect. She now stood in the middle of a dimly lit field, storm clouds covering up any possible trace of sunlight. There was no longer a gravel road that would lead back into the forest from where she came. In fact, there wasn't even a way for her to get back into the forest. Circling around her were deceased trees, branching out completely, causing her unable to leave the field. In a wave, the green grass turned into old, rotten dead pieces of grass.

As she passed through the large field, she noticed a strange object lying on the ground. The only other sound throughout the quite place was her footsteps through the passing grass. As she got closer, she noticed that it was a young man. He appeared to be completely still. Luna's worst fears were realized when she noticed who it was that was lying on the ground.

Luis Medina's eyes were completely open. He looked as if he had been involved in the middle of a fight. His hair was much messier than usual, his clothes are ripped and ruffled, and bruises lay all over her body. Tears streamed down Luna's eyes, wishing that she could get the image out of her mind. The suddenly, Luis's right arm twitched. Luna at first believed that it was a trick of the light mixed with her tears. That theory was quickly thrown off of the table when his entire body moved in a spasm. Luna's eyes examined his body and closed in around his neck, noticing two tiny openings where blood began to spill out. His eyes began to flutter, and his light brown eyes slowly dissolved into the blood red irises of a vampire.

Slowly, his body began to raise, his hair covering his face from Luna. Luna wished that she could run away, but her body was now completely paralyzed. She couldn't understand if she was unable to move out of complete fear or if the unknown force was now keeping her deadly still. Her mind fought, but her body didn't respond. All she could do was witness whatever was going to happen.

The two of them stood eye-to-eye, Luis's face almost emotionless. Luna had only hoped that she could hide the emotions that were running through her mind; fear, anger, and above all, loneliness. The two of them stood silently in the opening for over a minute, studying each other's faces.

The nightmare had ended there, with Luna waking up in a cold sweat over a month ago. Even thinking about it caused her to become breathless. A few times, she would try to use one of her spells and make sure that she still had her powers intact. The simplest of these spells was when she held a glass ball in her hand, imagining it to turn itself into a glass cup. She learned that spell casting was very much like a chemistry, involving the Law of Conservation of mass; what you put in is what you get out. Less than a second passed and the small orb transformed itself into the cup she desired. It was a simple spell, but it had a strange calming effect on her.

Luna had always been able to remember every single one of her dreams, each one varying in detail. She wasn't quite sure that it was due to her being a mix of a werewolf and a spell caster or that it was something that was another thing that was special about her. No matter the cause, this particular nightmare was one that she could remember in very fine detail. Going back to sleep was something that she gravely protested and refused to do.

She blamed the nightmare itself on what the vampire, Karin, did to her on the night that the two of them had met. That in itself was much like a dream. Looking back at it, she felt very stupid for not looking at the logic of the moment. For one thing, Luis didn't know where Luna lived at that point in their relationship and there were no clues in her "human" life about what she really was. Not only that, but he used a gun to kill both the werewolves and the vampires involved, when she knows full well that such a weapon could barely injure them, let alone kill them. The illusion was all in the moment, and probably anybody else would have acted the same way if it happened to them. Still, Luna was hard on herself for not really noticing something that was quite obvious.

Drake had been very on guard since his failed attempt in trying to kill Alexander. Letting him go was probably the sloppiest mistake that had ever happened to him. Leaving loss ends just dangling out in the opening wasn't a part of his character. He was on edge, wondering if Alexander was going to come back to the hideout. Obviously, he hadn't gone to the werewolves, probably because Alexander felt that Drake would expect him to do that. Right now, he didn't want to be found out by anybody. That bought Drake some time to think, but he knew he didn't have much. That night was only a fluke, and Drake knew that was a fact. Alexander was always stronger than Drake, but Drake was much smarter and resourceful.

Recently, Drake was the only person who left the hideout to retrieve blood for everybody. Karin would explore the apartment building throughout the daylight hours as well as the hours that they were forced to stay inside. It went up too thirteen stories, something very untraditional in this kind of architecture. She slowly paced through the entire building every day, glancing at the detail. She even claimed the entire sixth floor of the complex for her own personal use. During a riot that broke out downtown a few nights before, Karin had snuck out of the house and acquired a television set, a DVD player, and a stack of movies. She had a love for films and created her own small, personal theater in one of the spacious rooms on the sixth floor.

Of course, Karin's absolute most favorite part about her new lifestyle was that she was no longer who she had to be. Alexis had made well on her promise to show Karin how to become much younger, back into her mid-teens. When they did the special enchantment, Karin had to have as much blood in her as possible. New vampires didn't have complete control over their bodies, and even doing simple things could result in them burning out before they ever started "living". Fortunately in Karin's case, her first attempt was all that she needed. She forever wanted to look as she did at sixteen years of age: lean, bouncy, and absolutely full of life.

Tonight, Karin didn't feel like watching through any of her movies, nor did she want to explore more of the secrets of the apartment. While Drake was out, she travelled up to the thirteenth floor, which was used as their headquarters and where the main television was located. Up there was Alexis, who seemed to just be staring at the screen, focusing on absolutely nothing. If Karin didn't know better, she would have guessed that Alexis was actually sleeping.

"Alexis," Karin said in a shy voice. "I was wondering about something."

Alexis broke her focus from the television and to the young vampire who was asking for help. "What is it Karin," Alexis asked, trying to sound sympathetic.

"It's about my memory," Karin answered. Alexis's face changed, seeming as if she understood what Karin was going to ask, but she didn't interrupt her. "I can remember vividly everything about who I was when I was alive. I was an actress who got lead roles almost every time. This change has also made a lot of things in my past much clearer; I can see the kind of clothes I used to wear when I was in elementary school. But, when I try to think of the day I was turned into a vampire...everything goes blank. I remember clearly finishing up rehearsals for _Rent_ , and then, the next thing I remember is waking up in this building, feeling like I was starving. I'm not even sure if that last memory even took place on the same day I changed; everything is such a blur. Why can't I remember anything?"

As Karin was speaking to Alexis, she stood up and the two of them began to walk the hallway. Alexis had always felt that walking was very therapeutic and helped clear out her thoughts. Alexis was careful to let Karin express what she was feeling.

"I went through it too," Alexis said after a few seconds of silence passed. "It's an amazing feeling, isn't it? Being able to remember things that you otherwise forgot or you couldn't remember quite clearly. But I was bugged by why I couldn't remember what happened to me on the night I changed. Drake always told me about what it was like when I changed, but part of me didn't believe him. It took me about a year until I was finally able to remember what happened to me.

"Alexander had a theory about why this happened. Our bodies go through a lot of trauma when we're changed into what we are. Our brain is very much affected by the venom that's running through our veins, releasing many of our memories so we can clearly see them. However, our short term memory of that day is damaged, that is, until almost a year after we change. You'll know what happens when your mind is fixed. Don't worry about it too much."

These days, Alexis didn't like discussing Alexander too much. She was grateful to him for teaching her how she could properly live her life, to help humanity. That all being said, she had lost trust in the man she once knew. What Drake had told her and Karin, about how Alexander was planning on killing all of them, it affected the very memory of a man she once saw as the father she never really had. The only person she was willing to trust now was Drake, but it wasn't for the reasons why she used to trust Alexander.

"By chance," Alexis said again, "do you want to look and see the night that I became a vampire?"

"What?" Karin asked, looking dumbfounded.

"You can look into my mind, right?" Alexis seemed to be trying to leading Karin on.

"Yeah, but I don't think I can reach into someone's memories." Karin had an uneasy feeling in her stomach, as if she wasn't sure if she said something that was stupid.

"How do you know if you haven't tried?" Alexis asserted. "It's not going to hurt either of us; all that you're going to do is tell me to think back to when I was changed. When you get your memory back of when we changed you, you'll understand why it all feels so strange."

"Alright," Karin said, in a bit of a flat tone.

Karin and Alexis's velvet eyes stared deep into each other's. Karin did her best to focus, grabbing a hold of Alexis's mind. S _how me what happened when you were turned into a vampire_ , Karin though, hoping that Alexis's plan would work. It was obvious that Alexis was already in a trance, so Karin closed her eyes and looked into the events that were unfolding inside Alexis's mind.

It was as if Karin was living inside an old black and white movie. She was standing next to Alexis. Around them, it was nightfall, and very few noises were being known. It took Karin a while to understand that they were in the middle of an old hospital. A nurse staring at the chart for a patient came into the room, passing straight through Karin, as if she were a ghost. She looked at the name on the chart the nurse left behind. She gasped when she noticed it belonged to Alexis.

" _Two years before this point in time, I had been diagnosed with the AIDS virus," Alexis narrated as they looked at the Alexis in the past, lying in her bed. She appeared to be very sick, almost as if she was already a corpse. The Alexis in the memory was obviously older than what Alexis chose to be in her vampire form. "In the late eighties, I was in my fifties, and I worked as a nurse before I was diagnosed, so I knew that there was no way to help me. I was surprised that I lived as long as I did. My husband divorced me after the diagnosis, and I chose not to stop him. On this day, I knew that this would be my last day alive._

" _However, I knew that there was one person who needed to say goodbye to me before I passed on. Care to take a guess on who it was?"_

Before Karin could answer the question, she felt someone pass through her just like the nurse did only a minute ago. The man was tall and wearing an aged, leather jacket, a black shirt, and faded jeans. He had hurried to the past-Alexis's side, who smiled when she saw him coming through. The two of them appeared to be very different in age, but they seemed to share a very special connection. Karin stared at the young man for a few seconds until it all finally seemed to click inside his head.

" _No way! Is that Drake?" Karin blurted out. The past-Drake was a bit younger than the Drake she usually saw, but she could easily tell by his forcefully hidden red eyes that he was a vampire at this time._

" _Yep," Alexis answered, smiling._

The two of them looked at the memory unfold. Drake was holding tightly onto Alexis's hand. The two of them were speaking in low tones, Alexis's being a bit shaky. The vampire- Alexis and Karin moved in closer in order to hear their conversation.

" _Do you remember when we first met," The past Alexis asked to Drake. "It seems like so long ago. That fire nearly killed you. I was glad that I was put on your medical team to help you get better. You became a good friend for me these past few months. Thank you, Drake. For everything you've done for me."_

" _Alexis," Drake sighed. He seemed to be avoiding all eye contact from her at all costs. "You're probably the most decent human being I have ever met. Everyone else...they don't care. It seems like they all have no sense of morality."_

" _Hush," Alexis weakly ordered him. "I'm just like everybody else; everybody is flawed, but you have to look passed those flaws and look at what really is important. I'm going to be okay, and so will you. Don't give up hope just because I'm gone."_

" _What if you don't have to leave," Drake pressed. "What if I knew there was a way to save you, to not only stop the virus, but to stop you from dying completely?"_

Slowly, Alexis sat up in her bed, fresh tears in her eyes. She believed that she was done crying, knowing that she was going to die today. She reached out and held onto Drake. It surprised him, the feeling of the woman holding onto him as if he were her only lifeline. Drake hugged her back, trying to make sense in all of this.

" _I told you, quit worrying about me," Alexis told him. "We're both going to be okay. You're my best friend; and if there were some way to stay here, you know I would take it. I want to keep the only friend I have left."_

Alexis's divorce had recently been finalized at this point. The man she had supposedly loved for the last decade ditched her when she needed him the most. One by one, everyone who was important in her life decided to leave her alone to die. Love was now something far beyond anything she wanted; she couldn't be in love with Drake, but that didn't mean that she didn't care about him.

Suddenly, Alexis's body ceased movement. Curtains covered and doors shut, Drake dug his fangs into Alexis's neck. Alexis wished to scream out in pain, but Drake kept his hand over her mouth. He finally released her neck and allowed her head to fall back onto the bed. Her eyes were slowly fluttering and she began to slip out of consciousness. Until her last breath, Alexis held onto Drake's hand.

The memory had finished. Both Alexis and Karin was pulled quickly back into reality. The two of them were back in their apartment complex, staring at each other. There was nothing else that could be said between the two of them. The silence between the two of them seemed to say absolutely everything.

The quiet was broken a few seconds later, as they heard the elevator door ding. Emerging from the elevator was Drake, carrying two body bags. He dragged them into their own separate rooms without even noticing the two girls that were around him. Karin could only guess what was going on while Alexis understood what was happening. He was recruiting new members for their family.

Ever since Alexander had betrayed Drake and ran away, Alexis could tell that Drake was much more serious and stern than before. He didn't seem to want to do things Alexander's way anymore. All Alexis wanted to do was survive, which is what a life with Drake seemed to guarantee. These new members, they were probably here to help keep their family together, at least, that was what Alexis was hoping.

Chapter Six: Chelsea

Nothing ever stays.

Her attachment was unwise,

for it now must end.

On this cool October night, Luna was wishing to not attend school the coming morning. In fact, she honestly didn't feel like doing anything. She knew that something like this was going to happen, but she didn't wish for it to happen so soon. This kind of stuff always seemed to happen to her whenever she was happy; disaster had to strike, tearing apart her paradise.

But, what else could she possibly do? It wasn't like her father was asking her to do a favor that she could easily say "no" to. This was a flat out order. The words kept playing though her mind, as if it were a scene in a horror movie.

"I don't give a damn about how you feel about him! He's a distraction to what's important right now. Look at the newspapers, Luna! People are disappearing, one by one. You have to know what that means. They will use him against you if they get the chance. You have to get that stupid boy off of your mind for good."

Luna wished that she could protest against her father, or that her mother would try to see thing from her point of view. She had seen the newspaper headlines, and she knew exactly what was going on. She wasn't some little girl who needed to be told what to do for every small thing. _Aren't I allowed to make some decisions for myself_ ; Luna asked herself as tears flowed down her cheeks.

She didn't wish to leave Luis, for a great number of reasons. For one thing, he was probably the nicest person that she had ever met. He never judge her for anything she did, his view on her had never changed. Luis was also someone who could easily make her laugh about almost anything. Everything about him seemed to bring out only the best in her. It was foolish, but she knew that she was really starting to fall in love with him. Even though it would never would have worked out, she liked to pretend that the two of them had the possibility to be happy together.

That's why she was running like crazy, trying to avoid everything else in the real world. Tonight, she was alone. The feeling she once cherished was now something she never wanted to feel again. It was foolish of her to think that there was someone out there in the world that she could permanently call hers. A dark void was building in her heart.

Tonight was just another routine watch around the city, but she had her own mission. She knew that it would probably not change her father's mind in anyway, but it was also very suicidal. Luna had decided that she wanted to find out exactly where the vampire's hiding place was. None of the Estrella family knew where the vampire's hid from the sun during the day; it was a secret that everyone was surprised that they could hide for so long. Before she could do any of that, Luna had to make a little side trip. All of this sneaking around behind her parent's back excited her. No one was there to stop her, but that also meant no one was here to save her.

On the outskirts of downtown El Paso, Luna did her best to blend herself in with the shadows. The last thing that she wanted to do was have someone see her and call animal control. She carefully moved around until she reached the place she was looking for. It was a very small apartment complex; one that only ascended three floors. She didn't need to climb though; her target had a single room apartment that was on the first floor. Luna scratched her paw on the door until she heard someone rustle through the room.

Opening the door was a very tall, and very tired black-haired woman. She was only wearing a nightgown and normally wore glasses. It took her a few seconds to find out that there was a large wolf at her front door.

"Luna," The young woman said in a groggy voice, "what the hell are you doing here? You realize that it's past midnight, right?"

The young woman allowed Luna through the doorway and into the small apartment. She immediately ran onto the bed and under the covers. Luna was very shy when it came to transforming back into her human form, even if she was standing in front of another girl. As she changed back into her human form, she wrapped the comforter around her body. It was soft and warm, causing Luna to wish that she could go to sleep, even for a little while. The idea was quickly expelled from her mind when she remembered that she was on a mission. She looked over at the woman who lived in the apartment, Luna's face looking desperate

"I'm sorry, Chelsea," Luna said in a weak voice, "I should have called you in advance, but I really need your help."

Chelsea Marquez was a very unconventional kind of person. Much like Luna, Chelsea was a mix of werewolf blood and witch blood. Chelsea was two years older than Luna, but they had been friends ever since the two of them had met a decade ago. Chelsea was an only child who grew up with a single parent, her mother, who was only a witch. Her mother actually had an affair with Victor, and caused her to become pregnant. The two of them never saw themselves as half-sisters, only friends. They both believed that being best friends was a much closer bond than being forced together by blood.

"What's wrong, Luna," Chelsea said, walking towards her closet, grabbing a set of clothes for Luna to quickly put on.

"I...um, need some help with something," Luna said, her voice becoming uneven. "I need some information."

Chelsea was an expert on almost everything about everything supernatural. Although she had the book smarts about everything, that didn't mean that she was able to put it all into practice. Chelsea wasn't as strong as any of the Estrellas, and she didn't go into her werewolf form as often as them either. Victor had disowned her since her birth, and he still does, believing that she isn't a suitable werewolf to carry down his lineage. Those two hadn't seen each other ever since Chelsea was three years old. Although, the whole situation seemed to motivated her in a very different way; while the power of a werewolf was mostly physical, having book smarts in being a witch was just as good as being a very powerful spell caster. She very much understood the importance of how logic plays into it; she compared it to the Law of Conservation of Mass that she had learned in her science classes all those years ago.

"What is it that you need to know," Chelsea asked.

"Well, do you know much about vampires," Luna asked, hoping for the best.

Chelsea stared off into space, appearing deep in thought.

"Well, I know a lot about what they have to do with werewolves, how they used to be on edge with each other. Now, we're all just trying to co-exist with the normal people. And, werewolves are really the only creatures who can defeat a vampire in a fair fight. Besides the whole, not coming out in the sunlight stuff, I can't think of anything else on the top of my head."

"Wait," Luna interrupted as Chelsea got up to retrieve her books, "why exactly can't vampires go out into the sunlight? They can handle regular lights just fine; what's wrong with them coming out in the daylight?"

"Well, it's not really the light that bugs them too much," Chelsea began to explain, grabbing a number of books out. "Werewolves and vampires both get most of their energy from the same source, the moon. However, werewolves aren't affected by the sun because, we are still partially human. Vampires, medically and scientifically speaking, are dead beings. The power from the sun's rays, mixed with the supernatural elements of their bodies, causes them to burn. If they are exposed to enough sunlight, they will burst into flames on the spot."

"Interesting," Luna commented just to fill the awkward empty space. "Do you know if they have any other weaknesses?"

"I believe just one other," Chelsea responded, trying to remember all the facts. "This may just be a part of regular legends, but it hasn't been disproven. I think that pure water is something that hurts them. It cancels out all of their powers and, if I remember correctly, causes a significant amount of damage to them." Chelsea stopped herself for only a moment. "Why are you asking so many questions about killing a vampire?"

"Just curious, but that's not really the reason why I came here," Luna answered; trying to avoid the question she was being asked. "I need to know something else, about werewolves."

"I don't like them either, but I hope you're not planning on killing your family." Chelsea joked.

The two of them shared a few seconds of laughter. Chelsea enjoyed having a good relationship with Luna. She was the only one of the Estrellas who had any kind of contact with her. She was also the one who taught Luna a lot about magic when her own mother was too busy handling other things. If it wasn't for Chelsea, she probably wouldn't have been as much of a talented half-witch as she was now. There were times where Chelsea would join Luna on her midnight adventures as wolves. Her coat was as dark as the night, and she was easily able to keep up with Luna. Magic would always be her first love though. Intelligence was something she took pride in, jumping ahead of everybody, as she went to college much earlier than most people her age and is currently in her last year of schooling. Somewhere in Luna's big heart, she wished that her father would for once accept how great his first daughter really is.

"So, what is it exactly that you need to know," Chelsea asked, crossing her legs.

Chelsea didn't need her books for anything that had to do with this subject.

"Well, I was thinking," Luna began stuttering, "do werewolves...that is, is it possible for a regular human being to be turned into a werewolf, just like they can a vampire?"

Chelsea paused for a few seconds. Her eyes seemed absolutely vacant. In almost an instant, she knew the answer to Luna's question. Answering it though; would it be wise if she did? She opened her mouth, only to close it again. There was no way of telling Luna without first knowing what her intentions were. Luna caught signs of Chelsea's body language and began to smile.

"There is!" Luna cheered, throwing the blanket over her head, exposing her naked body.

She blushed; remember that Chelsea had laid out fresh cloths for her only a few minutes ago. The blanket still around her, she rushed to the bathroom with the clothes in her hands. This at least bought Chelsea a few minutes of thinking of how to respond to Luna. She had never lied to Luna before, and had never planned to before this very moment. _What is she thinking_ , Chelsea pondered to herself. Slightly embarrassed, Luna tiptoed out of the bathroom and back onto the bed, the blanket still covering her.

"Luna," Chelsea began slowly, "I need to know why you are asking me this?"

"I have my reasons," Luna muttered, "but, it's for a good reason, I promise. I know that you know that there's a way to do it. Tell me."

"I can't," Chelsea said; her voice as firm as her stance.

"What do you mean 'you can't'?" Luna demanded out of Chelsea.

"I'm not going to tell you about this until you tell me exactly why you're asking me this." Chelsea tried her best to keep her voice as even as possible. Chelsea knew that Luna could probably over power her if she decided to. Still, she knew that standing up to her was right.

"I'm just curious." Luna lied, avoiding eye contact with her friend.

"Don't give me that load of crap," Chelsea shot back. "This isn't the kind of stuff that you ask someone about on a whim, just because you're curious. There's a reason why you want to know this, and I want to know why. Wait; is this about just some guy?"

"You sound exactly like dad."

Luna didn't think before she spoke, and as soon as she was halfway through her statement, she wished that she could close her mouth and take it all back. She couldn't dare look at Chelsea in the eye; there was no way that she could avoid Chelsea's reaction. Whatever happened to her, Luna wouldn't protest against it, because she knew that she deserved it. Seconds passed, and Luna was waiting in anticipation. She heard a little bit of crying, but nothing else. Two minutes passed by, and nothing seemed to happen.

Luna picked up her head a little, to see her friend's face. Her face was red and tears were streaming down her face. She wasn't expressionless, and it didn't seem to tell Luna that she needed to leave. Every time Luna felt the urge to head for the door, Chelsea's eyes caught her. They were screaming for her to not leave her alone; not now. Luna reached in, to hold her friend, her very sister, in her arms. Chelsea clutched tightly onto her.

"I'm sorry."

There was nothing more that Luna was willing to say. She wasn't going to beg Chelsea for forgiveness, she didn't deserve it. She absolutely hated herself for what she said, so why should she even both wanting to be forgiven. It took a while for Chelsea to calm down, and everything seemed alright. Luna wasn't there to cause Chelsea anymore scarring. She began to remove her clothing, to transform back into her wolf form, when Chelsea looked at her with a questionable look.

"You're leaving," Chelsea asked.

"I... I'm really sorry about what I said. I think it's best if I don't bother you again for a while." Luna did her best to hide her face.

"Don't go," Chelsea protested. Luna looked at her, absolutely dumbfounded. "I said I wouldn't help you if you didn't tell me what was going on. I'm not asking for specifics; I just want to help you make the right choice."

Luna placed back on her top and took back her seat on Chelsea's bed. Chelsea was well prepared to listen in on Luna's explanation. Luna felt that this is all she could do to prove how sorry she was to Chelsea. She wasn't only going to be truthful to Chelsea, but she was finally going to be honest with herself. For a while, she's wanted to hide her feelings that she'd had towards Luis.

Everything was laid out on the table, starting exactly where it all began, on the day that the two of them had met in the library. Luna spoke about how kind the young man was to her, and how they enjoyed laughing and having fun over the smallest things. Chelsea had become fully engaged in Luna's story, not interrupting her for anything. Chelsea was so glad that Luna had found someone that she was happy with. She could tell how her explanation was going to end well before they reached the conclusion of her story.

"I guess I love him," Luna began to conclude, taking in a deep breath. "I know that the two of us have only been together for about two months, but I finally understand that I do love Luis. I'm afraid to tell him though, not just that I love him, but about what we really are. That nightmare the vampire girl gave me really shocked me. What if he really doesn't accept me for what I am; what if I am a monster in his eyes, you know?"

"Right," Chelsea commented to prove she was really paying attention to what Luna was saying.

"But, there's something else that's going on," Luna continued, trying her best not to cry. "I got in a huge fight with my family before I left tonight. You know about all of the disappearances that have been happening around us lately right; people just suddenly go missing."

"Yeah," Chelsea answered.

"Well, everyone seems to be jumping the gun and blaming it on the drug cartel, which really isn't a bad cover for everything, but we can easily tell that it's something else. It's the vampires. Dad – err, Victor suspects that it's a new group of vampires that have entered town. He doesn't want to do anything that'll start a war between all of us; he wants a peaceful resolution. But if we do have to end up fighting, he's not too sure if the vampires that have already been living here will fight with us. The last thing that anyone here wants is a war.

"The reason we fought was because of Luis. It was very lucky of me to allow them to let me date him in the first place. In Victor's eyes, I should be going out with other werewolves, so we can have a strong litter." Luna scoffed at the notion. "I don't want to be forced into some kind of fake marriage just to make him happy; he's already done enough for me to make me want to leave this place as soon as I graduate. But, that's not why he got me so upset. Like I told you, he's worried that we're going to get involved with some war with the vampires."

"Just get to the point, Luna!" Chelsea exclaimed. She didn't want to make herself seem crass, but she hated when Luna just talked in circles for no reason.

"He told me I had to break up with Luis," Luna spoke. There was no feeling inside her words; that's all they were, words. "He thinks that if they find out about Luis, that they can use him as some kind of hostage. He doesn't want to take any kind of risks, and he thinks I'm going to be weak simply because I'm a girl. I hate this! I don't want to break up with Luis. The last thing that I want to do is hurt him!"

Luna was crying into the blanket. There was nothing more than her wishing that she could just tell Luis everything. _He's a good guy, a great guy; he didn't deserve to be hurt by anybody._

"So, you want to turn him into a werewolf so you don't have to break up with him," Chelsea asked. "I don't want to sound inconsiderate, but doesn't turning him into one of us put him in even more danger?"

"I know, but I don't care," Luna answered. "I know that we can make this work if we try hard enough. He'll understand, I know it; and he'll be a really strong werewolf with some training. So will you help me? I don't care if Victor doesn't accept you; Luis and I could live here with you if we had to."

There was a capricious change in the air as Luna was speaking. She changed from a sorrow filled girl to someone who seemed hopeful. Chelsea couldn't tell if Luna was just joking around with what she was saying or if she was being serious. Still, the two of them were smiling at that point, and Chelsea really wanted to help Luna in any way that she could. She wanted to see Luna's relationship with Luis blossom into something good, and rubbing something into Victor's face wasn't a bad perk either.

"Luna, are you sure that this is what you want," Chelsea said in a very stern voice. "This doesn't only affect your life, but it greatly affects his. Do you really care for him this much that you will stand by this decision for the rest of your lives?"

Both of them knew the answer to Chelsea's question well before she finished it.

"Yes, I'm sure." Luna answered.

Chelsea glanced outside the window. "Well, I guess I have no choice but to help the both of you. But, it's going to take a little while. For one thing, he's not going to be able to transform until a few weeks. This reminds me, happy Halloween, Luna."

Chapter Seven: Halloween

Dusk, All Hollow's Eve,

A new plan will now lie out.

The road is not smooth.

"Happy Halloween," Luan chimed back to Chelsea.

To everyone else in the world, today was a day of dressing up in costumes, get as much free candy as they pleased, and see how much trouble they could get into without getting caught. For Luna and Chelsea, this was their favorite day of the year for the same reasons, but also for different reasons. For one thing, the day the two of them had met each other was on Halloween, ten years ago.

Halloween was also a night where their magical abilities were at their absolute peak. All the conditions seemed right. It didn't require as much energy for the two of them to use spells, which was a real relief for Luan. She remembered one year where the two of them used up the entire morning to practice levitating off the ground. The very next year, they took it one step forward by practicing an old witching cliché by practicing enchanting broomsticks to fly. They used the day to do things that they normally couldn't do, although they would soon become skilled enough to do it any time that they wished.

Chelsea looked at her clock and slightly gasped. It was a little passed two, meaning that Luna had been here for about an hour in a half. That was more than ninety minutes she was supposed to use for patrolling the city. In an instant, Luna understood what Chelsea was thinking and shook her head.

"Forget about it," Luna told Chelsea. She didn't care what her original plans were; she was having a better time with Chelsea. "Even if something happened tonight, there's no way I could do anything to stop it without putting myself in danger. How about we have some of your famous pancakes for a special Halloween breakfast?"

"With pleasure," Chelsea said, smiling.

She didn't get up to have to do anything. At first, she simply closed her eyes, and clasped her hands, as if she were praying. There was a huge smile on her face. It had been a while since she had made pancakes, and even longer since she had them with Luna. She clapped, and then opened her eyes. It felt like a gust of energy escaped her. There was a bustle in the kitchen area, and various things began to move. The skillet moved onto the stove, which was heating itself, and the pancake mix was pouring itself into the bowl. The fridge burst itself open, with the eggs, milk, and butter escaping. Everything seemed to be following a perfect cadence, and it brought amazement to both of the girl's faces.

"I love it when you make pancakes," Luna said in a childish voice. "It's always magical."

The two girls laughed at the very terrible pun as if they were back in their younger years. The remembered how hard it was for them to be together when they were younger, and how hard it was to do something as simple as make pancakes with their magic. Luna felt bad; she hadn't seen Chelsea for a few months. Senior year had been catching up on her, and she had just been too busy with everything. _Not anymore_ , Luna said to herself as she saw the batter pour itself onto the frying pan. _She's just as important to me as Luis is; maybe not in the same way, but she deserves the same amount of time_.

"So," Chelsea began, feeling completely energized once again, "are you ready for me to tell you about how to turn your little boyfriend into a werewolf?"

"Yes," Luna groaned, impatiently.

"Well, do you know that old myth that they always tell in stories that a werewolf transforms under the light of the full moon even though we know that's not true," Chelsea began, becoming ready to act all bookish. Luna nodded, signaling for Chelsea to continue. "Well, there is a little bit of truth to that. In fact, there's a lot of truth in the old legends about witches, vampires, and werewolves because we all once lived in a great co-existence where everyone could be who they were. Our reasons for hiding is because of a few bad vampires, but the legends still lived on to warn everybody about exactly what's out there.

"Very rarely, back then and even now, did people transform others into werewolves. It just wasn't done, unless it was something like your case, but there is a way to do it. The way to turn somebody into a werewolf is by biting them, and even at that time, the process isn't complete."

"You're saying that we have to bite them just like the vampires do," Luna asked.

"More or less," Chelsea responded, "although, you do have to bit him while you are in your wolf form, so I don't suggest biting him on the neck. On his leg or arm is okay; just be aware of how hard you are biting him. With vampires, it takes a few days because there is venom running through that person's blood. With werewolves, there is no venom at all; the bite leave a mark on the human, and doesn't do any real changes or harm to him. That is, until thirty-three days after they are bit."

"What happens after thirty-three days?" Luna pondered.

"They die." Chelsea did not wish to say those words to Luna. "The mark becomes infected and the human will expire, unless they transform into a werewolf. For them to transform, they must be caught under the light of a full moon. That is when their First Transformation takes place. After that, they will have all the powers of any other werewolf out there. You just have to make sure that he's hit by the full moon's light when it comes around."

"And when's the next full moon," Luna asked as a plate of pancakes glided over to her spot on the bed.

"Around Thanksgiving, if I remember correctly."

Luna oddly felt accomplished by what she had learned. She didn't know exactly how she was going to get around biting Luis, but she felt she had a great starting point. Now all she needed to do was figure out the road of getting straight to her final point.

Luna returned home well before dawn made its way past the mountain-side. She was still very angry with her family, so she refused to speak to any of them, especially the man she would not just refer to as Victor, as she got ready for her day at school. With the time that she had left, she packed another small bag full of clothes and hid it deep into her closet. There was absolutely no way in Hell that she was going to tell any of her family what she was planning, so she was simply being prepared for anything to happen. If she had to leave home that night, if she decided to bite Luis on that day, then so be it.

Her school day was much better than she had really expected. On her walk over, she had fun transforming small rocks onto the floor into tiny figurines. In one of them, she created a tiny Luis, holding her tightly in his arms. In another one, she crafted what she imagined Luis would look like in his wolf form. It was a very odd thing for a seventeen year old girl to be fantasizing about. Still, it was all that she wanted.

Unfortunately, she didn't have much time to spend with Luis today. He had arrived to school much later than usual, with having only five minutes of hanging out before the first bell rang. Luis still did walk Luna to her classroom, which was always an event Luna enjoyed. They held hands tightly, which always caused butterflies to stir deep inside her stomach. That feeling only sated her until it was lunch time. At that point, she had really wanted to talk to Luis. She wasn't too sure if she was going to tell him about her double life, but she just felt like talking to him. Today, she was going to break all the rules that were set up for her.

It was also unfortunate for Luna during her lunch period. Luis had appeared in front of her only ten minutes before classes resumed because he had to do a make-up test for one of his classes. The look on his face was enough to show that he felt terrible about missing lunch with her, so she let it slide. There was always time after school that they could talk.

Luis seemed to be running everywhere today, and he felt absolutely terrible that he let Luna suffer for his mistakes. He was having some trouble adjusting to his new surroundings, and it didn't help that it was his final year of high school. He wasn't where he wanted to be at this time of the year, so he wanted to catch up in every way that he could.

He held tightly onto Luna's hand as they walked down the hallway, escorting her to her next class. Moments like these were what Luis looked forward to most of all on his school days. He knew that he had to make all of this up to her, big time, and he was planning on having a special night with her tonight. It was Halloween after all; a number of places were having dozens of specials for tonight. And he could tell that this was a holiday that Luna found the most fun in. She was dressed as a traditional witch, but it had to be the cutest witch that he had ever seen.

"Luis," Luna said to him in an uneven voice, "there's somewhere that I want to take you after school. Are you free?"

Luis was confused by what Luna was saying. "Where are you taking me?"

"We're just going out," Luna answered, biting her tongue. "Is that okay with you?"

"Luna, I have to stay a little late today. I need to make up that test that we did in Pre-Cal. I know I can do better than what I actually did."

"I can wait," Luna informed him.

"Well, if you're willing," Luis said as the two of them reached Luna's next class.

Time passed by quickly, and Luis was hardly able to focus in any of his classes. There were so many stressors that were going on all around him and he wish he could just escape it all for one day. Unfortunately, there was nothing that seemed to be going his way. He was working as hard as he could, but he felt nothing could stop him from completely crashing and burning by the time winter break would come along. He wasn't even feeling easy about what Luna had to tell him once school got out. It obviously had to be important if she's really willing to wait after school to talk to him.

Before he knew it, he was in the middle of his Pre-Cal class, learning about the three things he had been dreading all year: sine, cosine, and tangent. Understanding it all in itself was a pain, but it was also the inversions and when to properly use them that really added to his struggle. He cursed whoever came up with these mathematical properties and whoever thought it was necessary to teach high school students this kind of stuff.

Ms. Ramirez seemed to be oddly interested in Luis today, and he clearly noticed her strange attitude. She had been calling on him for almost every other question, expecting him to know everything. It was actually Luna, his partner in crime, who was helping him get all of his questions right. It made him feel a little bit uneasy about everything that was going on, and almost made him rethink staying after school. _You need the points_ , Luis reminded himself over and over again.

The final bell couldn't have come any faster for him. Ms. Ramirez stayed in the shadiest part of the room as all the students burst out of the small portable. The only two left in there were Luis and Luna. Luis had already said he was staying after school to take the retake, apparently the only one in the class to choose to do so. It didn't matter to him; points were points, and he knew that's all that mattered at this point.

"Luna, I need you to step outside while Luis takes this test," Ms. Ramirez instructed Luna as she handed Luis two sheets of paper.

"That's fine, ma'am," Luna answered.

Luis wished that Luna hadn't left him. The room was oddly chilly, although his entire body was sweating bullets. Part of him figured that he was just sick and should probably rest after his meeting with Luna later. He turned over the papers on his desk, and was shocked. They were absolutely blank; there were no questions for him to retake the test. Before he could react, he heard Ms. Ramirez bolt lock the door.

"What the hell's going on," Luis said out loud. He moved out of his chair, scared for his life.

"Now, now," Ms. Ramirez said in a coy voice, "we can't have that little pup mess up my plan. I've had my eye on you for a long time, Luis. I can tell that you're just my type."

Luis couldn't believe that this kind of thing was actually happening right in front of him. He had heard strange stories on the news about teachers taking advantage of students, but he never would have bet that he would become one of those cases. There was nowhere else for him to run, and he was sure that Luna wasn't anywhere near the door to hear him call out for help. People were too busy trying to rush out of the school to pay attention to his screams.

"Leave me alone," Luis's voice begged although he knew that he was powerless.

In a split second, it seemed like Ms. Ramirez transported herself from one spot to another, from one end of the room to the other. Many of the desks were thrown over in her path, and she was holding Luis very tightly. He could smell her breath on him; it was a terrible rancid smell that made Luis wish to vomit. He wanted to break free, but she was too strong. He would have never guessed that this frail woman had the strength of a body builder. Nothing in this situation seemed to be making any sense to him.

"Calm yourself, Luis," Ramirez ordered him as she tried to cease his squirming. "I'm not doing this just as a whim. Out of all my students, you are the most brilliant and most hard working. With blood like yours, I'm sure that it must be delicious, and would probably be smooth going down this throat. I can just tell everyone that you got involved in some accident after you passed my test with flying colors."

He was completely convinced that his math teacher was a complete psychopath! _She's really going to kill me after she's done with me_ , he thought as warm tears flowed down his cheeks. But there was nothing else that he could possibly do. Ramirez through Luis straight to the floor and pinned him down. There was no way that he could get of there.

BANG!

The locks of the door had completely blown off of the door and the door burst open like a gunshot. Luis was shocked to believe that someone had actually heard what was going on; the portables were practically sound-proof from the outside and they were in the middle of the portable lot where no one would willfully pass by. The two of them turned their necks to the door, to see who had the power to break down the door.

It was Luna, looking completely enraged. Luis now believed that he was the one who had gone completely crazy. The situation was just too insane for it to possible be reality. _I'm dreaming, I have to be dreaming. I'm going to wake up any minute. I'm not going to be raped by my teacher, and these two girls aren't super powered maniacs_. Softly, Luis was laughing at the entire situation, but neither of the females seemed to be having the same kind of reaction.

Luna slowly walked to the middle of the room, and as she passed each window, the shade that was covering the sunlight completely ripped from its placing. Ms. Ramirez let out a loud hiss as she jumped away from Luis's body and back to a place under her desk. Luna stopped herself once she reached Luis, but each of the shades seemed to rip open by themselves She knelt down next to him, inspecting every exposed part of his body. His laughing seemed to stop as he looked at how serious Luna's face was _. This isn't a dream, is it_?

She placed him up back on his feet and embraced him. For some reason, she seemed completely relieved, like the worst had passed for the both of them. In fact, Luna had felt like laughing at the whole situation as well.

"Are you okay," Luna asked him in a low voice.

"Never better," He answered, not sure if he was really telling the truth. Of course, he had to ask what anyone else would ask in this kind of situation. "Luan, what the hell is going on here?"

"I'll explain later," She said in a hurried voice as she held his hand, trying to run out. Luis seemed to refuse to move.

"No, not later; now!" He answered. Luis's face was as hard as hers. In the moment, she laid a passionate kiss on Luis's lips. She wanted to show him that he could trust her completely.

"I promise I'll tell you everything," Luna answered him, holding onto him tightly. "We have to get out of here though. Once we're safe, I'll be able to tell you everything. You have my word, Luis." Luna knew it would only be two hours until sunset, and Ms. Ramirez would be free from her bright prison. She then turned to her teacher, who was hiding inside of her desk, the only place where she could find refuge. "My father will be hearing about what you were trying to do with Luis."

Without anything more to say there, the two teenagers ran out of the portable, hand in hand.

Luna didn't wish to introduce Luis to her life style this way, and definitely not to something like this so soon. She had no idea what she was going to do now. Going to her family didn't seem like a good idea, especially when she was ordered to dump Luis less than twenty-four hours ago. She also wasn't too sure whether she wanted to bug Chelsea at the moment either. Luna felt like she had bugged her enough for one day, especially after what they were talking about earlier that morning.

She even contemplated running away with Luis; having him go home, grab his car, and drive as far away from Montwood high school, far away from El Paso, Texas, far away from everything that she knew. Of course, that didn't seem to be the smartest to do either, but there seemed to be no other choices. None of these ideas seemed fair for Luis in the very least, but it also wasn't fair to drag him completely nowhere.

Then suddenly, Luna probably did the most embarrassing thing she had probably ever done in her life. She was three blocks away from the school and stopped her running, causing Luis to almost trip over himself. In the middle of the sidewalk, in a traditional witches outfit, she let out a very loud scream, something she hadn't done since she was a very young girl. Luna didn't care if anyone was staring at her; she just wanted let it all out.

Luis didn't leave Luna's side and wasn't tempted to. It wasn't because the entire situation had rendered him completely speechless, but he felt safe with Luna. She came to his rescue; her main purpose was making sure that he was alright. Luis believed that she came to help him not because it was the right thing to do, but because she deeply cared about him the same way he cared about her.

Strangely, that scream was exactly what Luna had needed. It was like she expelled every single stressor that was going on in her life, and reverted back, the only difference being that it was now she felt she had some sort of plan in her head. What she had to do was probably the worst to pick out of all of her ideas, but it was also the best idea. She just didn't want to admit it to herself yet. She couldn't have herself face her family, not yet anyway. So, she decided to go for the next best decision, for now anyway.

"Luis," Luna said as she turned to face him, although not in the eye, "do you mind if we borrowed your car for a while?"

Chapter Eight: Truth

They run to safety,

although, nothing seems right. Now,

they must make a choice.

Both Luis and Luna sat quietly inside his Ford Escort. The only time either of them spoke to each other during that car ride was for directions to where they were going. All Luis knew about the situation was that they were visiting some kind of friend of Luna's and she didn't go any further into the details. Luis wasn't even sure if he wanted all the details about what was going on anymore. In less than an hour, it seemed like his entire life was going to change. For better or worse, he couldn't tell.

She stopped them in front of Chelsea's apartment, which seemed drastically different in the daylight hours. It looked so much older in her eyes, almost as if it were completely abandoned. Only a few cars were in the parking lot, and Luna was pleased to get a parking spot right next to Chelsea's room. The car completely stopped and the dead silence filled the air. It was a minute before Luis let out a small cough. Luna opened her door, and Luis followed suit. The last thing he felt like doing was get her upset at him.

"Is your friend home," Luis asked, desperate to break the strange silence between the two of them.

"She should be," Luna answered in a monotone. She wasn't quite sure of everything herself. "But if she's not here, we can just wait around until she comes back."

"We're not going to break in, are we?" Luis couldn't help but hide how nervous he was. Luna quickly caught wind of what he meant: if they were going to burst open the door the same way she did so in the classroom.

"No, we'll just wait inside the car," Luna reassured him.

The two of them approached the door slowly, Luna making sure she had a tight grip on Luis's hand. She was surprised by how afraid she was, even though Luis was the one who was going through the shock-of-the-century right now. She could only imagine what was going through his mind right now, and yet, he still trusted her as if nothing had happened. She knocked on the door and waited a few seconds. Luna felt very relieved when she heard rustling on the other side of the door.

Chelsea answered her door, in a bright red witch's costume, holding a bowl filled with candy. Chelsea's smile seemed to widen when she noticed that it was Luna who was at the door. Her eyes did wander to the young man who seemed to be holding on tightly to Luna.

"It's a bit early for trick-or-treaters," Luna told Chelsea, hoping to defuse any tension that may have lingered.

"Can't be too over prepared," Chelsea fired back. "Is this him?"

"Um, yeah." Luna wasn't quite sure how she was supposed to act in this situation.

"So you actually did it?" There was a bit of surprise in Chelsea's voice. "You actually told him everything?"

"Not exactly," Luna said, leading the two of them inside the small apartment. "It's kind of a long story."

Luna wasn't quite sure of where to begin. She needed to fill Chelsea in on the events that led them to their current mess, but she also didn't want to leave Luis completely out of the loop of what was going on. They just couldn't start talking about vampires and werewolves without letting him in slowly. This would have been another moment where she wanted to let out another loud scram, but Luna just didn't have the energy to.

To everyone's surprise, Luis was the one who decided to start the talking.

"A lot of it seems a bit fuzzy. I couldn't believe what was going on; I thought I was lost in some kind of a dream. My math teacher...she just started attacking me out of nowhere. I thought that she was just going to kill me. Then Luna...she just broke down the door and the window covers just ripped themselves off. I think Ms. Ramirez, out teacher, jumped off of me, like she was allergic to the sunlight or something. Next thing I knew, I was being dragged out of there by Luna."

Chelsea listened very closely to what was going on. She was able to piece everything together all on her own as Luis tried to explain exactly what he saw. In her mind, she pictured Luna saying a simple spell to break through the locks of the door, but her powers were magnified significantly today, causing the door to probably get blown off of its hinges. The thought of Luna using her powers to open up the window covers led Chelsea to conclude that their teacher was a vampire, and that Luna knew the teacher's identity all along. Chelsea knew that there were vampires who tried to blend into everyday society, but it was obviously very difficult for them to do so. She'd never encountered a vampire during the daylight hours, but she knew how simple it was for a werewolf to spot a vampire. All you had to do was pay attention to all the signs; every vampire shares the same weaknesses after all.

"So, why did you guys decide to come here," Chelsea asked, warming up a pot of water for tea. "I mean, I love company, but I'm not quite sure if I'm the safest person to be with if she comes looking for you."

"She didn't come after us," Luis added quickly. "She hid completely under her desk. I don't understand why she didn't come running after us. Shouldn't we call the cops or something?"

Both girls did their best to hold back their laughs. It was reflex that they shared; the thought of actually calling the cops about a vampire attack. Of course, neither of them wanted Luis to be the odd man out. It wasn't his fault that he was the only human in the room.

"Well," Chelsea began carefully, "I think there's a very good reason why she didn't come running after the two of you." She spied Luna, who was flashing a very stern look. "Oh, come on, Luna, he's going to have to find out anyway!"

"I know, but," Luna began to say before Luis interrupted her with "Find out what?!"

"That your teacher is obviously a vampire who wanted to feed off of your blood." Chelsea said bluntly.

There it was, out in the open. _Your teacher is obviously a vampire_. No, it didn't seem obvious to Luis, not one bit. He felt like he was being set up for some kind of joke, a very elaborate and convincing joke at that. He looked over at Luna, hoping for a sign that told him that this all wasn't real. His hopes were shattered when he noticed that there was no change in Luna's expression. Luis had never seen her so serious before.

"Well, how would you know that Ms. Ramirez is a vampire," Luis asked them. "I mean, that's a bit of a bold statement to say of somebody, isn't it?"

The two girls looked at each other, trying to figure out the next best move to take.

"Let me do it," Luna told Chelsea, who simply nodded as her response. She then shifted her body back to Luis. "The reason we can say this is because...well, we're werewolves."

"Liar," was Luis's only response.

Neither of the girls seemed to flinch at what Luis had said. Other than what happened in the portable, they really had nothing to show him about the existence of the supernatural. For Luna, at least, this was a good thing. It was much calmer than she had original imagined this scenario, especially after her little episode with Karin.

"We're not lying," Chelsea protested. "We are werewolves, and get ready for this kid, but Luna and I am also part witch."

That statement had obviously sounded much better inside her head, but there was no way around it. She was tired of Luna's beating around the bush and treating Luis as if he were a toddler. There was no reason for him to not know about anything now, and this would make it easier for him to choose to become one of them. Chelsea thought that was what Luna had wanted in the first place. Of course, there was only one way that they could convince him that they were telling the truth.

"I'll prove it to you then," Luna said, her voice very stern. "But, this is the only change of clothes I have, so I don't want them to rip."

Luna picked up the blanket from Chelsea's bed and wrapped it around her body. She then carried it into the bathroom with her as she changed out of her costume. During that time, Chelsea did her best trying to explain to Luis about how a werewolf transform, mainly that their clothing does not change with their body. She wasn't sure if Luis was paying any attention to what she was saying, but she felt that it was worth noting to him, so he wouldn't be lost in what was going on.

Luna stepped out of the bathroom slowly, holding the blanket tightly around her body. She took in a few deep breaths and concentrated. She didn't understand why she was so nervous about transforming; she had probably done it hundreds of times in the past. Was it really because she was doing it in front of somebody, and not just anybody, but the person she seemed to care about more than anything in the world?

Luis was amazed and startled by what he was watching. Slowly, Luna was changing shape right in front of him. First, it was the hair. It seemed like the color of her hair magically changed color and began to wrap around her entire body. During that time, her face muscles began to transform as well. Her nose grew, changing into a snout, and her jaw began to extend as well. Luna dropped the blanket, her entire body covered in fur. She then fell on all fours, causing all of her limbs to change. The whole process took less than a second, but it seemed to be happening in front of Luis in slow motion.

A werewolf was standing right in front of Luis and Chelsea. It seemed to be standing completely still, its tail wagging and her tongue panting. Luis tried to look deeply into its eyes, the only aspect of Luna that didn't seem to change. The wolf whimpered as it slowly approached Luis. Part of Luis wished to run away as fast as he could, but a dominate part of him told him to stay completely still. The wolf didn't seem to wish to attack him, but to simply be near him. As the wolf reached for his hand, she softly licked it, hoping to prove that she was completely harmless.

"Luna," Luis softly said to the wolf, "are you really in there?"

He placed his hand at the top of the wolf's head and began to scratch its dark ears. The tail seemed wag faster as it was panting with glee. The wolf rubbed up against Luis's leg in an affectionate way, and Luis was no longer completely frightened. He knelt down to get a closer look at Luna's eyes. He could clearly see her inside of the wolf's body, wishing for his acceptance. They stared at each other for a few moments, having a conversation of the minds. He then hugged the wolf tightly, still amazed by what was going on around him.

"She was afraid that you wouldn't accept her," Chelsea added. "She thought that you would go completely crazy and kill her."

_Kill Luna_ , Luis thought in horror. He had to be fair; learning something like this about your girlfriend wasn't something that happened to every single guy. A bit of fear still lingered inside of Luis, but he was able to look past it when he looked deeply to find Luna within those eyes. He released the wolf and grabbed the blanket from the floor.

"This is all a lot to take in for just one day," Luis said, slightly apprehensive. He then placed the blanket on top of the wolf. "I'm sorry, but can I have my Luna back, please?"

The wolf nodded. She placed her entire body under the blanket and stayed completely still. The outline of the transformation could be seen from the movements of the blanket. Luis imagined it as a complete reversal of transforming into the wolf. In a second, there was a beautiful, young woman where a wolf had once stood. She wasn't facing Luis; she couldn't do it when she was in this kind of state. She wished that she could see her blushing, and be able to see the smile that she had planted right onto her face. Luna knew that it wasn't a complete acceptance of what she was, but it was a start. Luna hurried into the bathroom to change back into her clothes.

An hour passed, the three of them simply talking about their lives. Luis learned that Luna and Chelsea were half-sisters, but lived a life that was much deeper and more powerful than that. Although the werewolf thing was something he was still getting used to, the fact that they were both half-witches seemed to intrigue him so much more. Luna demonstrated her power by using the blanket that they were sitting on and had it levitate them an entire foot above the mattress. Mostly due to the power surge running through her body today, Luna was able to lift all three of them on the blanket for a fair amount of time.

Suddenly, Luna's phone began to ring. She picked it up without looking at the caller ID, which was probably not the smartest idea.

"Where are you," Victor yelled out at his daughter.

"I'm, er, at Chelsea's," Luna answered. She figured that it was better to simply tell the truth now, hoping that it would help her escape a lot of the trouble she had ensured for herself today.

"What are you doing there," Victor exclaimed loud enough that Luis and Chelsea were able to clearly hear. "It doesn't matter; just get back home now!"

"I'll go only if Luis is allowed to come with me." Luna's voice had become firm.

"Out of the question! I told you to dump him and that's final." It was very clear at this point that Victor was beyond angry.

"Well, I'm not dumping him. I told him everything about us! Vampires, witches, werewolves, everything. In fact, I want him to become one of us." Luna wasn't quite sure where all of this was coming from. Maybe she was just sick of not being heard by her father. "He was attacked today by Erica, your friend who works at the school. He needs to come with us, so he's safe."

It was obvious that her father was a loss for words. In a mere day, he had completely lost control of his daughter. She had disobeyed him and had done something that he absolutely couldn't believe.

"Get over here, now," Victor ordered his daughter. "If you must bring him, then fine."

"And Chelsea, too." She added. Even she couldn't believe what was coming out of her mouth now.

Victor was now beyond angry, but he was absolutely tired with fighting. "Just get your ass over here. I don't care who you're with, do as I say, Luna."

The phone line quickly went dead. Luna imagined her father slamming his phone on some sort of table. She knew that she was going to get it once she got home. _I'm tired of being controlled by him_ , Luna thought in anger. _This is my life, and I can be with whoever I wish to be with_.

Luis and Chelsea both stared at Luna.

"What was all that about," Luis asked her.

"My dad wants me to get home," She answered, looking at the two of them. "Both of you are coming with me. It's much too dangerous if we're apart."

"Luna, I c-can't go," Chelsea stuttered desperately. "We both know that I'm not welcomed in that house, or anywhere your family is."

"You're my friend, and I say that you are more than welcome inside our house," Luna shot back as she grabbed Luis's hand. "Plus, you know more about this transformation stuff than I do."

"Transformation," Luis questioned.

Luis and Chelsea knew that they were absolutely powerless under Luna's whim. If she decided on something, there was no reason for arguing. Chelsea did her best to hide her smile while Luis was still confused by the entire situation. They had to hurry back to the other side of town. Sunset would be approaching, and their cornered math teacher would soon be set free. Where she would decide to go, no one could possibly guess.

Chapter Nine: Regrets

All blood filled anger,

She ran to the only place

she ran away from.

Erika Ramirez was counting down the minutes until sunset. She did her best to ignore everything and find a way to pass the time. This must have been the slowest Halloween evening that she had ever experienced. It seemed like the sun knew exactly what she was going through and decided to taunt her freedom. Her only bit of luck was that the light didn't hit anywhere near the desk she was hiding under. On top of having the door blown off of its hinges, she didn't want to deal with spontaneous combustion.

Finally, the room was dark enough where Erika could tell that there wasn't a trace of sunlight left in the air. She cautiously stepped out of her room, hoping not to be met by Halloween pranksters; _with the mood I'm in_ , she though deviously, _I would really feast on anybody. I was a fool to go after someone that well connected with a mutt like her._

Erika hustled to her car, frustrated with the car door and the engine as well. Nothing seemed to be going quite her way today. She let out a small sigh of relief when the car engine revved up. Speeding past unsafe trick-or-treaters, Erika hurried to the one place that she swore she would never be visiting again.

"How can I face them, especially Alexander," Erika pondered to herself on the drive up there.

She remembered the days of where she lived in a small family, their leader named Alexander. They each made sure the others needs were met, and they all lived in a comfortable apartment. However, earlier in the summer days of this year, she had a disagreement with their leader. He would always protest how she would go out into the daylight and have a job and that she would be tempted into feeding off of innocent, young humans. The last thing that she wanted to do was prove him right.

She was reluctant to remember the way to the hide out. She had honestly hoped that her mind would have erased the memory of the place completely from her mind. She couldn't face any of them the way she was now. And she knew that she would have to be facing the werewolves sooner or later. _All of this for some great smelling blood that I couldn't even get to sample_ , Erika groaned.

Finally, she reached her old home. Much like a vampire's body, it didn't appear to have even aged a single day. She didn't need to break down the door or perform some kind of trick on the lock. She knew that the door was always left wide open, mostly because there was no need for any other person to come inside. It was their personal secluded place away from the humans. She pushed in the door, just like she used to, and walked straight to the elevator. Pressing the button for the top floor gave her the feeling of cold feet, instructing her that this was a much worse idea than going after the werewolf's boyfriend. Before she could continue her protest, the doors closed around her, taking her right to the heart of her ex-family.

As the elevator rose in altitude, she couldn't help but feel this odd lingering feeling of change. It wasn't the kind of change that she had been expecting to experience. Although it seemed like a contradiction of Erika's own lifestyle, it felt like there was no more "life" within this place. Something vital had been missing for a long time now, she just couldn't pin point exactly what it was.

The doors had opened; Erika was completely surprised that she wasn't greeted by anybody. She at least expected Alexis, who was always watching television, to have noticed the elevator ascending. Part of her guessed that her family had evacuated this place a long time ago, probably a while after she left. That though was shattered when she was struck right in the back.

" _Oomph!"_

Erika's body fell straight to the ground, collapsing all across the floor, her body now in a star shape. She felt like crying, but crying was simply impossible for a vampire. She moved her entire body to the left, dodging her foes next attack. For the longest time, Erika believed that her super speed was completely useless. Erika was able to catch a good glimpse of her attacker. The young man looked the same age as her students. His hair was short and dark and he was completely dressed in plead. He cocked a devilish smile at her, seemingly ready to laugh on the spot.

"I guess Drake was right when he said that we would be having intruders after all," The young man commented. "He figured that it would be a bunch of pranksters wanting to explore an 'abandoned complex', thinking it was a haunted house or some crap like that. I'm surprised that it's another vampire tough; I never thought that this day would come."

"What day," Erika asked, trying to regain her balance.

"He always warned us that another vampire may want to attack and break up our little party here," The young man spat back at her. "He said that it was supposed to be some old guy, but Drake didn't put it passed him to want to recruit some new members."

"Why is Drake giving out orders?" Erika tried to keep up her guard and to have this guy talking. She was less worried about actually beating him and just wanted to get out of there.

The young man let out a loud chuckle, almost as if he found true amusement in the situation. Erika's body began to shake. She couldn't imagine what was going on in the head of this little psycho.

"Stop talking," The boy ordered Erika.

Erika tried to run, but there was nothing she could do. Sure, she was fast, but this young man was much faster. Before she could even move a centimeter, he had his fist right in the middle of her gut. In the middle of his strike, he grabbed a hold her head. The force was so great, that it had completely decapitated her. Her skull was beginning to crack as her body was flopping to the other side of the room. Erika could feel every single bit of pain in her skull. As she screamed out in agony and mercy, the young man was having a jolly laugh. His face distorted as he let out each chuckle.

"Calm down, Light," spoke a soft voice in the distance.

From the darkness emerged a very slender young, blonde woman who looked similar to the young man. She wasn't smiling the same way Light was; her face appeared to be as hard as stone. She grabbed Erika's skull, which was letting out an inaudible wail, and tossed it in the direction of her body.

"Aw, calm down Maka," Light said in a relaxed tone. "You take things too seriously. Plus, he told us to make sure to execute anyone vampire that sided with that Alexander guy."

"Well, how do you know if she was a part of his group," Maka questioned, walking towards Erika's body.

"Instinct," Light laughed.

Maka didn't really enjoy the fact that she was going to have to spend the rest of eternity with her twin brother. On most days, she found him extremely annoying, but today was one of those days where she wished she could put him on fire. She poured gasoline all over Erika's corpse, as if she was pouring it over her annoying brother's. She then lit a pack of matches, watching the body go up in flames. It didn't scream or cry out in pain. The only thing that Erika could wish for was that she had the power to cry. Fate had always been cruel to her while she was alive; there's no reason why it would ever be fair to her in the end. The final thing she saw before she was engulfed into the flames was Light chuckling at her misery. _The perfect miserable ending to a nothing like me._

Luis didn't feel too comfortable with Chelsea driving his car. She seemed to be handling the turns miserably as she listened to Luna spitting out directions to her house. In all honest, none of them wished to go visit her family. It had actually been suggested a couple of times that the three of them run away. Luis was still trying to adjust to what was happening in his life. Everything seemed to be linking together, one-by-one, but he was still refusing to listen to what was going on and believe the reasoning he had been taught to trust in all these years. But he had seen Luna in her wolf form with her very eyes, and he was certain that he wasn't stuck in another one of his insane dreams.

"Luna," Chelsea said in a pleading voice, "are you really sure that you want to bring me with you? I can always wait outside until you're done with your talk."

"I'm sure," Luna answered in a rough voice. "I need both of you there. I want to show Victor that he can't treat me like a little girl anymore."

"It's not your father that I'm afraid of," Chelsea returned, pulling up to Luna's house. "It's your mother that worries me. I'm probably not her favorite person in the world, am I?"

Luna paused. Neither of them could escape the fact that Chelsea was considered, to both of Luna's parents, a mistake in their relationship. No one was quite sure if Emily had completely forgiven Victor for what he did, but she probably didn't want to be reminded of his infidelities. Luis had been filled in on Chelsea's identity during his period in her apartment only a little while ago. He could never see himself in that kind of situation, cheating on someone that he was supposed to care about. Of course, now, the stakes were raised much higher than anyone could guess. Luis knew that he was now with Luna for the long haul, and he didn't want her to do anything to him in her wolf form. Of course, it also begged the question: Does Luis really _love_ Luna?

It was almost completely nightfall. Small children were lining the streets, dressed up in tiny costumes, pretending to be what they were not. The trio snuck their way out of the car and to the front door of Luna's house. Before they even reached the front door, the entrance way opened for them. Standing there was Luna's brother, Phil, with a very confused look on his face. There was no way to read his emotions; she couldn't tell if he was anxious, worried, or just plain scared out of his wit!

"Mom and dad are fighting," Phil said in a solemn voice. "Kara's out trick-or-treating with her babysitter. We had to call her in at the last minute so she doesn't hear what's going on."

"I-I'm sorry," Luna told him, ducking her head inside her robe.

"Save it," Phil told her. He examined the three of them, giving off an obvious look of surprise when he saw Chelsea was with them. His eyes quickly darted to Luis, who tried to give off as little eye contact as possible. "This is the boy; the one that's so important that you'd risk your whole family's life for?!"

All three of them flinched at Phil's harsh sounding words. Chelsea knew that this was a terrible idea from the very start. Part of her wanted to run away from the situation, but Luna had a firm grip of her hand. She did her best not to stare at Phil in the eye as they passed through the threshold. As they entered the living room area, they could hear Victor and Emily verbally combating what seemed to sound like complete nonsense. Their presence was immediately known while both Rick and Phil plotted a seat on the couch, hoping get a good view of the sparks.

"Luna, where in God's name have you been," Victor hollered at his daughter.

Before anyone else could speak, Emily had cut in between the two of them. Emily appeared to be weak, but being married for many years meant that she knew how to hold back her husband when he is hot tempered. Chelsea did her best to hide between her two friends, although she knew that it would be to no avail.

"Why are they here," Emily asked her daughter, pointing out Luis and Chelsea.

"Because they have a right to be here," Luna protested, keeping her feet firm on the ground. "Chelsea is my friend, my best friend, and I welcome her into this house with open arms. Luis is here because he was attacked by Erika, your friend, dad."

"We've had Ms. Ramirez before," Rick added to the conversation. "I'm pretty sure she wouldn't have done such a thing."

"Well, she did!" Luna exclaimed. She hated the feeling of being treated like a liar.

"Was he bitten," Phil chimed in.

"No, I got to him just in time," Luna asserted. "If I wasn't there to help him, he'd probably be dead by now. Isn't that what we're here to prevent?"

"Why didn't she go after you," Phil interrupted, eager to hear the story.

"I trapped her with the sunlight," Luna answered. "She's probably left by now if she knew what was good for her."

Victor's attention seemed to completely change. He pointed right at the twins, who were goofing around on the couch. "The both of you; drive out to where no one can see you and patrol as much of the city as you can."

Normally, the twins would protest, but they knew not to turn on their father's orders today. They quickly made their way out of the house, knowing full well that it was going to be a rough couple of nights ahead of them. Oddly, the tension in the room seemed to weaken with the twin's absence, although every one of them remained standing. Chelsea wasn't hiding behind her friends either, but standing firm with them.

"Am I allowed to say something," Luis said, wishing to get a word in edgewise. Everyone turned to look at him. Everyone seemed to appear confused by Luis's words. To Luis, the silence meant that he was free to say what he wanted to say. "I promise not to go around blabbing your secret. It's not like anyone's going to believe me anyway, even if I did. And if there is any way that I could help you guys, I'd be willing to do it."

"There is nothing you can do, boy," Victor exclaimed.

"A-actually, there i-is," Chelsea chimed in to the conversation. The sound of her voice seemed to turn a number of heads. The fact that even she was speaking at a time like this must have meant something. "I did a bit of reading into it, and it turns out that he can become a werewolf, simply by being bit."

"That is absolutely out of the question!" Victor bellowed, causing Luna to cringe for a second.

"I believe that it's my choice if I wish to become one of you or not." Luis fired out at Victor.

Everyone became quiet. Not even Luna or Chelsea could imagine Luis saying that. If they hadn't seen Luis's lips move as he spoke, then they would never had believe that Luis really said what he said. Victor appeared beyond angry now. Luna knew this look; she quickly grabbed both Chelsea and Luis's hands and ran out of the house. The sound of objects being destroyed and glass breaking could be heard from the outside of the house. She threw both of her friends inside the car, trying to keep the two of them safe from Victor's wrath.

Most of the time, werewolves were able to keep control of the balance between their human form and werewolf form. However, when one experience high emotions, no matter which emotion they express, their hormones start to go out of control. Suddenly, they involuntarily transform into their wolf forms and cannot decide on when they can change back into their human form. Luna saw it coming a mile away, making sure that the safety of those closest to her were top priority. Luis jumped into the driver's seat, jumbling the keys within his hand. The three of them breathe a sigh of relief once they heard the car engine start. It was still early in the night, meaning that young ones were still out and about. If anything, it gave the three of them a head start on escaping.

"Where am I going," Luis asked the two girls sitting in the back seat.

"Somewhere, anywhere," Luna begged! "Let's run away to California for all I care, just get me the hell away from that place!"

Running away wasn't something that Luis felt like doing, not now. He thought about his family; his over bearing mother, his cheating father, and his sister who just wouldn't mind her own damn business. They all had flaws, but Luis felt that he couldn't leave his family behind, but he doesn't want Luna to feel unsafe. No matter what, he was going to stay with her tonight. He couldn't admit it to anyone else, but he was in love with Luna Estrella. That much was proven true when he told her father that he was willing to become a werewolf in order to keep her secret. He wasn't sure what all the risks were, but he was ready to do anything for Luna. He was even prepared to die for her if he had to.

Chapter Ten: Family

Security gone,

time passes all of them by.

Life continues now.

It had been about a week since the events of what happened on Halloween. Luis was lucky that he didn't get in too much trouble for staying out so late. Luna on the other hand didn't seem to have such smooth sailing. She didn't return home that night, and hadn't gone back since. Chelsea had welcomed into her apartment with open arms, allowing her to do whatever she wished during the night. One night, the two of them turned into their wolf forms, just running though out the desert that was in El Paso. They would bark happily and play as if they were both pups again. It was the most fun that Luna had had in such a long time outside of being with Luis. Luna still attended school and cherished every moment with Luis she had.

No one had seen Erika Ramirez since that Halloween afternoon. Both Luis and Luna felt awkward, knowing that she probably had to run as far away as she could. The official story was the she was now considered a missing person and the authorities were searching everywhere to find her. So, on the first day back, they didn't have to attend their final class because their teacher wasn't present at all. However, they would be cycling through a number of substitutes for the remainder of the semester as the school tried to find another candidate for another good math teacher.

One day, after school had ended and Luis was taking care of Luna, he asked "Did the school board know that Ms. Ramirez was a vampire?"

"Of course not," Luna laughed. Luis hadn't seen exactly what was funny though. He was the one that almost because dinner for his math teacher. "Trust me; there are vampires, werewolves, and witches everywhere. I can spot one in a minute; I'm that good. But we can't just go around and blabbing to others what we truly are. No one wants another Salam Witch Trial."

"Are you telling me that they caught real witches back then?" Luis asked with astonishment. The Witch Trials were a subject that Luis was deeply interested in, knowing most of the lore and legends that surrounded that point and place in time.

"Nope," Luna answered with a gleeful tone. "Not a single witch had been caught ever. But, of course, there was times where witches decided to mess with the humans and make them think that others had magical powers. Whenever it turned out bad, it was the vampires and werewolves job to hunt down those terrible witches and bring them to justice."

"Wait," Luis interrupted, "you told me that no witches were killed during the Trials."

"Yeah," Luna reassured, "no one died in the official trials. Whenever someone goes bad and wants to mess up the co-existence between the supernatural and the normal, someone has to intervene"

Victor had transformed back into his human form two days after the incident, but he seemed to refuse to leave his office all day. Luna received calls from her mother and brothers every day, telling her that she needed to come home and they were going to talk it out. Every time, Luna refused their proposal, untrusting of the entire family. She didn't trust that her father could control his temper, and she didn't believe that they would listen to what anyone had to say.

There was nothing that the Estrellas could do to convince Luna to come home. She had obviously made up her mind, and she was of legal age to leave the house. They didn't want her to be away from the family; Emily, at least wanted to try and work things out. On Halloween night, Luna had made a promise to herself, which was that she wouldn't return home until she transformed Luis into a werewolf. It was to ensure that he wouldn't be left out of what was happening and she wanted to make sure that her family wasn't going to find some way for them to break up. The idea of them leaving each other was abominable. Chelsea and Luis were a part of her family plain and simple, and she wouldn't make a decision that would exclusively leave the both of them out.

To both Luna and Chelsea's surprise, Luis was very anxious to turn into a werewolf. He had seen both of the girls in their wolf forms and was completely amazed by the way they looked. Like giant dogs, they were very clean and very graceful. He had Chelsea explain to him again the entire process of the human's First Transformation. From what he understood, he had to be bit by either Chelsea or Luna (although he preferred it to be Luna) on any day and he had to just make sure the mark was hit by the moonlight when it was a full moon.

"So, why don't you bite me right now," Luis asked Luna as the two of them walked to his place after school. "It's just one more thing to get out of the way. It'll insure that I'll become one of you guys."

"What are you going to tell everyone at school, and your family, when you come home with a giant bite mark on your arm," Luna questioned in a stern tone. "I'm going to bite you the afternoon of the full moon, which is around Thanksgiving, so be patient."

"And what if I decide to ask Chelsea to bite me," Luis said with a sneer in his voice.

"Then I'll bite both of your heads off." Luna groaned.

"I'm only kidding, Luna," Luis said with a desperate laugh. "You know you're the only one I want to bite me."

"Gross," Luna playfully exclaimed, shoving Luis into a tall bunch of bushes. "I didn't know you were such a pervert. You truly are a dog, aren't you?"

Luis laughed. "You know you enjoy the teasing." Luis said, wrapping his arm tightly around her waist. The lighting seemed absolutely right for this moment. It was chilly, so Luna went in deeply into Luis's arms. The two of them slowed their pace as they watched the sun set behind the mountains.

"I love you," Luis told her, planting a soft kiss upon her cheek.

"Yeah, yeah," Luna playfully groaned, hanging onto Luis tightly. "You know I love you too."

The two of them saying "I love you" was a new development in their relationship. The first time Luis said it to her was on Halloween night, when Luna was too scared to fall asleep. She seemed to have not rested for days, something her body wasn't used to. He stayed there, holding her, whispering "I love you's" well into the deep, midnight hours. It wasn't something that was out of the blue; Luis had his own definition of what love was, and by that definition, he loved Luna with all of his heart. On that night, she was able to rest peacefully; even though Luis had to return home in the early hours of the morning.

It all was going better than Luna could have ever imagined. Part of her believed that it was all just a weird dream, and she would wake up from it any minute, back in her room, completely alone. Those thoughts quickly vanished when she was with Luis and Chelsea; she knew that they at least cared about her wellbeing.

It was two weeks before the scheduled full moon. The three of them were at Luis's house, the first time that Chelsea had visited his house in fact. It was almost sunset and Luna's phone began to ring. It was about time for her daily call from her family, trying to explain why she needed to come home. They tried every excuse in the book, but Luna believed she knew better than to believe them. She put the phone on speaker, to make sure that the two others would be able to listen in as well.

"What is it," Luna answered in a melancholic tone.

"You need to get over here now."

It was a different voice than Luna was used to. It wasn't her parents trying to communicate with her, but it was Phil. She could imagine him, holding the phone in his large hand, with her parents looking desperately in their son's eyes. She didn't understand why they chose to go this change of pace. _It doesn't matter,_ Luna thought, _I'm not going back until the full moon_.

"You've yet to give me an argument of why I should go back," Luna said flatly.

"How about because we're your family," Phil answered sarcastically. "Oh, how about this: Mom is worried sick about you. She's the one who keeps bugging you every day, trying to get you to come home. Quit acting like a little brat and get your ass back over here."

" _With my wittle tail between my wegs_ ," Luna mocked. Her voice than changed to her normal harsh tone she used whenever she talked to any of her family members these days. "I've told you all over and over again, I'm not going back to that house for anything."

"Then how about this," Phil said, his voice growing deeper and angrier with every syllable he spoke, "you and mom meet somewhere, in a public place; you can even bring your two little friends with you." His voice grew much lower and kinder. "Listen, she's losing sleep because she doesn't know if you're okay. Just do this for her, please."

Drake loved how much more powerful he was these days. His mind reading had become much stronger and much clearer. He was also much stronger and faster than he had ever been before in his life. Who did he have to thank? Drake always smiled when he thought of those who were sacrificed to give him his strength.

_They weren't innocent, that's for sure_. He couldn't hide his smile every time he thought of his victims. They were all guilty for the same crime: existence! _I will be their judge, jury, and executioner. They all deserve to die!_

His favorite new addition to their group had completely changed from Karin to Light. Although Light didn't have a particularly useful power, Light at least saw everything the same way Drake did. In his lifetime, Light enjoyed playing sick jokes on those who were much smaller than him. Now that Light was a vampire, everyone was on a step lower of the food chain. Whenever either of them went in for the killing blow of a human being, they would both laugh as if they were hyenas in the savanna. Drake was the sibling that Light had always wanted, forgetting completely about Maka most of the time.

Maka did her best to mingle in with the other vampires but seemed to be complete alone. Alexis was always too stunning for her to approach and she was afraid to look Karin directly in the eye. While Alexis had her movies, Maka had her books. In the daylight hours, everyone was still doing their own thing. When the sun began to set though, that was when they started to plan. With the rise in his numbers, Drake felt more comfortable letting his followers loose in El Paso. It was the same monologue with Drake every time, sometimes a little bit of a variation here and there, but the meaning was always the same.

"Our ex-leader, Alexander, is still out there. He had planned to kill me so long ago; he is a traitor to our family and to vampires everywhere. Always be on guard that he will attack you if he gets the chance. Do not allow him to get the chance. If any other vampire comes in that is not familiar with you: don't ask questions, attack! It is either us, or them. I don't know about you guys, but I'm not looking forward to dying because of a traitor's mistake!

"Remember, you all were chosen for one reason or another. There is no room for chance when fate is involved with the dealings. There are only truths, and the truth is that we are the superior being. Our old leader believed that we could co-exist with the humans, but what he spoke were lies. Look at how the humans treat wild game out in the jungles and in the forests. They attack them, and use them to sustain themselves until they need to eat again. Aren't we extended the same courtesy by the Universe, to hunt our game and to feed off of them as much as we please, indiscriminately? Go forward, and reap the benefits that you have earned as being the superior being!"

After his speech, Drake would break off the group into teams, one of which goes out to hunt for the family while the others hold down the fort. Tonight, it was Karin and Maka who went with Drake to hunt while Light and Alexis made sure that their home was safe. Alexis didn't have any trust in Light to keep things simple, but she knew that it was always best to obey Drake's orders. She lived for the kisses that Drake planted on her, and so much more that she didn't experience in her moments of life.

It was well past midnight and Alexis had decided to sit around and watch television. She was tired of being around Light's presence; she just couldn't see what Drake saw in the boy that made him useful. Yes, he was fast, but only slightly faster than most vampires. He had no respect for those who were superior to him and he seemed to just go off and do whatever he felt like doing. Alexis didn't care what Light was doing with his time alone, she was just glad that he was nowhere around to bug her.

And the feeling was mutual with Light. Although his emotions had always been twisted from the norm, he knew that his feelings for Alexis were filled with discontent and dissatisfaction. He saw her power to be much more useless than his, seeing that scents can only work so far on certain people. Light was well on to Drake's game with Alexis since the very beginning, which is why he hadn't said much to provoke a fight with her. If it came down to a fight, Drake would have to side with Alexis for the sake of his plans. That's how he became motivated to become much stronger, to show that he was a more valuable asset to him than Alexis would ever be.

All Light wanted to do was to see the world around him burn to ashes, no matter whoever was the one who struck the fire first, he would just want to help the fire spread. Deep down, he felt that was what he thought Drake wanted as well. The flames would probably rise much higher if the both of them worked together, but he also wanted to be the only one to enjoy the flames. No one was safe from his striking force, not even his twin sister. They were all just fodder for the flames, and he would laugh at them equally as they sacrificed their bodies for his amusement.

Luna wasn't used to being in a public place when it was nightfall. Usually, she would be inside her house (or, more recently, Chelsea's house) or patrolling the streets. She was never very social, so she didn't go out to parties nor do any other things a teenager might do on rowdy nights like tonight. In a sense, the feeling of sitting inside a booth at a fast food restaurant during a moon-light night was overwhelming. Luna had been waiting in the booth for a little lover ten minutes, slowly taking bites of her hamburger and fries. Luis and Chelsea were a few booths down from her, keeping their distance for mostly the sake of Emily. As long as Luna knew that they were at least in the same building as her, she'd give her mom the privacy that she asked for.

Emily walked slowly into the restaurant, doing her best not to make herself noticed by everybody there. As she spotted Luna, surprised that she was sitting all alone, her stomach began to turn. Her goal tonight was to bring her daughter home with her, no matter what. She knew that her goal was practically improbable to reach, but not entirely impossible.

Emily took her place at the table, being treated by Luna's poker face. They stared directly eye to eye for thirty seconds. Emily realized that she wasn't sitting with a little girl who had a false understanding of the world, but a young woman who has gone through plenty of her own experiences. What she was planning to say seemed no longer relevant as she stared her at her daughter's eyes. Yes, she still wanted Luna to return home, but she wasn't going to belittle her with words that would only persuade an ignorant child.

"Are you doing okay," Emily asked, being cautious with her tone of voice.

"I'm fine," Luna replied with a slight monotone. "How's everything at home?" Luna didn't really care, but she felt that it was the standard protocol to ask.

"It's the same as usual," Emily replied. "Your father really is sorry about what happened on Halloween night, but, you know how proud he can be with things. We really do want you back home, sweetheart; all of us do. We've heard that Erika still hasn't been found anywhere; don't you think the safest place for you to be is with your own family?"

"I can manage with Chelsea," Luna answered. "What about Luis's safety? He knows about us, and he's sworn to not share our secret. Like it or not, Luis will become one of us very soon. I care about him; don't you think that Erika would want to go after him after what happened? If he becomes one of us, he'll be safe."

Emily paused. She didn't know how to exactly answer her daughter's questions. She didn't want to lie to her daughter simply to bring her home, but this was also something that needed to be talked about with Victor. There was only so much that she could do, mostly because she was the only one in the family who couldn't transform into a wolf.

"I'll talk to your father on that one," Emily said, watching Luna's face. Luna's mouth twitched and seemed to lower her brow, breaking the eye contact. "I understand that if he chooses to become a werewolf; there is no way that we can stop that. I cannot promise that your father will accept him into the pack though. As for his protection, if your father is okay with it, you'll be the one monitoring his house every night until Erika is caught or until he goes through his transformation. Will that be okay?"

Luna pondered for a few moments and then pretended to ponder for much longer, to make it appear like she was seriously thinking all of it over. To add to the effect, Luna took a long sip from her drink. She stared passed her mother and towards Luis and Chelsea, who were doing their best not to draw attention to themselves.

"Sounds fair enough," Luna told her mother. "I'm still not going back though, not tonight. If you can convince dad that I can watch over Luis's house until the next full moon, then I'll move back in."

Chapter Eleven: Transformation

The day draws to change.

Transformation is his fate.

Monster, he will be.

It took a full night of arguing for Emily to convince Victor of the terms that she and Luna had agreed upon. By the next morning, Luna had received a call from her mother that she was able to watch over the Medina house until Luis had become a werewolf. It seemed that both of them were happy that this stand still had appeared reached an end, but neither of them expected it to be as peaceful as it seemed. When Luis heard the news during their time at school, he couldn't be more ecstatic. It was like he had his very own guardian angel watching over him.

Luna finally believed that revealing to Luis that she was, being half-witch and half-werewolf, was the best thing that could ever happen in their relationship. They had become much closer as a couple and completely trusting about one another. There were no more secrets about her second life; she could be completely out in the open with him about everything that would go on. Every day seemed to become easier and easier for them.

For the next two weeks, Luna spent the majority of her time with Luis. During the daylight hours, the two of them seemed to be always talking with each other. Then they would part ways, only for a little while, as they each went to their respective houses. As soon as Luna got home, she would start her school work. One of the conditions of the deal that Luna had to agree to was that all of her homework had to be finished before she could leave the house, no matter whatever her reason was. Lately, math had been her hardest subject. It wasn't entirely her fault though; with every new teacher came a new lesson and a new learning and teaching style. Unfortunately, the different styles didn't seem to mesh too well. There were a few times where she had to call Chelsea for help, which was always up to chance if she was really able to help. If she was able to understand what was going on, she would help Luna with no problem. However, if she didn't understand the problem, she would have to leave suddenly and not answer her phone for another hour.

There would always be a grin on her face when she finished her homework. It was just another task that had to be completed, and it would only have to last for a little while. With the remainder of the time, she would get some food into her system. When she got the okay by Emily (who seemed to be the parent in charge of her these days) to leave the house, she shot out like a bullet. Under the cover of night, Luna would go through the streets and straight to Luis's as fast as she could. Even when she was in her human form, Luna had the same kind of stamina as her wolf alter-ego. In one huge jump, she was able to jump over the Medina's eight foot fence without even breaking a sweat. His backyard was covered with bushes, making it the perfect hideaway for a werewolf that didn't wish to be seen by the naked eye.

Under the cover of darkness (and away from prying eyes) Luna stripped her clothing and transformed. There were nights where Luis stared out of his window for an hour, keeping an eye on Luna. He had gotten used to seeing Luna in her wolf form and found her as a creature filled with majesty. A few times, late at night, he would go into the back yard and simply sit down on a lawn chair with Luna next to him. Besides brushing his fingers through her fur coating, he didn't purposely treat her like someone would a domestic animal. The two of them would sit in silence for hours on end, staring at the stars and the waxing moon, counting down the phases until it would be completely filled.

It was now the date of the waxing gibbous phase of the moon, the day before the night of the full moon. Their nightly routine had only slightly changed, due mostly because school had been let out for the entire Thanksgiving week. Luis was planning on staying up the entire night with Luna, enjoying his last memories as a simple, weak human being.

A few minutes had passed the midnight hour and an idea had popped into Luis's head. It was the perfect way to cap off his last normal night. He turned to Luna, who sat diligently by his side.

"Luna," Luis called out in a soft voice. Luna's wolf-head pivoted to look at Luis. "How about you turn into your human form for the rest of the night? I doubt that Ms. Ramirez would come near this place, even if you were in your human form. You don't want to just sit in silence, do you?"

Before Luna let out a happy nod her tail had begun to wag rapidly. Luis went back inside, giving Luna some privacy to transform and to get her clothes on. As soon as Luna knew that Luis was in a place where he couldn't possibly peep at her, she ran into the bush where she had hid her clothes. She transformed back into a human and quickly dressed herself. Luna hurried back to her spot with a smile on her face. Noticing that Luna was returning, Luis went back outside. The two of them shared the same chair, Luna awkwardly sitting on Luis's knee. Neither of them could predict how much trouble they would be in trouble if Luis's parents had suddenly woken up and seen the two of them outside so late at night.

That was when the idea popped into their head at the same time. In a second they embraced each other, both of the lips kissing the others. Luis had placed his hand around Luna's breast, causing Luna to jump, but she didn't protest. She liked the feeling that someone out there in the world had found her attractive in that fashion. It wasn't complete lust that she was after, it was absolute attraction.

Their kissing riot continued and Luis massaged both of Luna's breasts. Luna let out a few, quiet squeals, tightening herself around Luis. The both of them felt absolutely ready for this. Luna trailed her tongue off of Luis's lips and onto his cheek. Luis felt a tiny pinch where Luna's lips where. Luna sucked on the area for a minute and then released her teeth from where she decided to bite him. This wasn't a bite that would turn him into a werewolf; it was more as practice in her eyes, or, that was how she justified her action. Her lips receded their way back to Luis's lips as one of his hands traveled from her chest to her behind.

Part of the joy was that it was all completely spontaneous. Luis wanted to be with Luna and Luna felt the exact same way about Luis. Although, no one seemed to want to move on further than just kissing. It was a while, but it was Luna who broke away. Instead of continuing on, she placed her palm over his mouth, signaling him to stop. His arms fell right to his side, realizing what he had done for the past several seconds. Luna's thoughts were everywhere now. There was no real easy way for her to tell him this.

"Luis," Luna started, her words sounding out every syllable, "I'm so sorry, but I can't do this now. It's not you, honestly, but can we just put all of this on hold until...later." Luis's face was puzzling. His eyes didn't seem to have a focus. "It's just, everyone in my family does something like this; they just have sex, and someone gets pregnant, and their forced into a marriage. I don't want that to be with me; I want to have an honest relationship, where you like me for me. I've already got you doing so much for me already; I can't possibly force you to do anything else."

Luis looked into Luna's sincere eyes, tears regrettably flowing down her cheek. He understood Luna's reasoning of holding off on something like this. There was no way he could just tell whether or not Luna was much stronger than him at the moment. Luis respected her and knew the right thing to do.

"I understand, Luna," Luis told her, holding Luna tightly. It wasn't an embrace like before, not one directed mostly by lustful hormones, but of friendship. Luis felt her warm tears flow down his backside, knowing that, in the end, he had done the right thing. Suddenly, something snapped into his brain, something that both he and Luna appeared to have overlooked. Luis's voice cracked. "Are you telling me that you want to marry me?"

Out of reflex, Luna's body jumped off of Luis and landed about a foot away from him. Luna's cheeks turned scarlet red as the tears appeared to have completely vanished from her cheeks.

"N-no," Luna answered, adjusting her face downward. "I don't think we're quite ready for that in our relationship either."

"R-right," Luis told Luna, mimicking her movements.

The day of Luis's transformation had finally arrived. It was the middle of the week, and Luis's family had left to one of the college football games. Luna's brothers were on the team, but Victor and Emily had chosen to miss the game this one time. Even Chelsea was invited to Luis's transformation, to which she hadn't directly answered yes or no. Luna had arrived in the middle of the afternoon, a while before the sun would begin crossing behind the mountainside. Her parents were expected to come by nightfall, to witness his transformation.

A werewolf transformation wasn't something that was supposed to be publicized. Many times, it was a private matter, done in absolute secrecy. These days though, it was quite rare for a werewolf to choose to transform a human into one of them, mostly because it had become a custom where werewolves only married other werewolves in order to keep their species alive. Witnessing a human transform was also something that had a number of different documentations, each one talking about various ways a human transforms, although they each provide the same prerequisite: exposing the bite of a werewolf under the light of a full moon.

"There's been a small change of plans," Luna told Luis as they both took a seat on the couch. "When the moon rises in the night, that's when my parents will come and drive us out into the middle of the desert. They think it's better that we have an open space for you instead of our backyard, since anything can happen. You might want to prepare an extra set of clothes." Luna let out a small giggle after her final sentence.

"Oh, right," Luis uttered.

It wasn't exactly his plan to strip buck-naked in front Luna, her mother, her father, and possibly Chelsea. That was why he was wearing his least favorite clothes today, an old t-shirt and shorts, to have something that he can rip through for the First Transformation. His cheeks began to burn as he thought back to last night and the inappropriate actions that he and Luna had participated in.

Lazily, they waited for Luna's parents to show up by watching television, something that had practically become the tradition of what they did whenever Luna came inside the house. Chelsea had also arrived an hour after Luna did. She seemed to cower in her own shell when she heard that she would have to be in the same car as the people who hadn't accepted her. Chelsea had hoped that going inside the same house as them would have helped her with the problem, but there was no hope for her at this point. She was still very frightened of Emily and Victor. Still, she was going to come along to bring support to her new friend.

The sun had finally begun to set upon them. With an extra pair of clothes in hand, Luis, along with the girls, waited patiently. The strange part for Luis was that he didn't seem afraid about what was about to take place. Oddly, he didn't have cold feet about becoming a werewolf; every fiber of his being wanted this to happen.

"It's time," Luna told the both of them.

She had been looking out the window for the past thirty minutes, watching for her family's car. It was no surprise to her that her parents decided to bring their Jeep. With Luna at the head of the line, the three of them left the house and went to the car. No one said anything, or attempted to make any eye contact. Victor seemed to be holding back his true emotions, only wearing a blank face. It scared Luna the most, worrying about what was going on in his mind at the moment. She'd actually prefer it if he was actually looking as if he were angry; it'd probably make a lot of the tension go away. _If he's going to act like this, then why did he decide to come along with us in the first place_ , Luna asked herself as they started cruising through the urban streets. _We could have made due just as well without him._

The car ride was deathly silent. Luis was glad that the hickey that Luna had tried to leave him the previous night didn't take. There was no way that they would leave this car alive if they had known that their daughter gave her boyfriend any kind of love bite. Luna and Luis were only holding hands, clenching them every few seconds when either of them felt terrified. Chelsea was wearing a dark hoodie, and hid her face inside the hood, hoping that the adults would pretend she was invisible and not cause a fuss.

Darkness had fallen across the town of El Paso, Texas. The Jeep had been going for about an hour, headed towards the mountains that lead you to the New Mexican border. Just before they entered the mountain side, Victor turned the car to drive straight into the desert. Luis wasn't quite sure if this was even legal to do, but now wasn't the time to bring up the laws of how to use deserted areas. They drove deeper and deeper into the desert for another half hour. The lights of the city only appeared as a blur to all of the passengers. The Jeep had finally come to a stop, but no one seemed to leave the car yet. It was twenty seconds of complete non-movement. Finally, it was Emily who opened her door and exited the car.

"Come on," Emily told the trio of young adults that were in the backseat.

The moon was slowly climbing the night sky. No one seemed to want to waste any precious time that they had. The moon appeared to be very full. It was a very spacious place; the only way that they all would be found is if someone purposefully knew where to go. It was still early in the night, but no one seemed to enjoy the quiet, cool atmosphere.

Luna and Luis embraced each other, both of them ready for what was going to happen. They were careful not to do any other public displays of affection in front of Luna's parents, but the both of them wanted to plant one small kiss on the other's cheek.

"Don't bite me too hard," Luis whispered as they let go of each other. "I'm not into that kind of stuff."

"It's just a love bite," Luna teased, sticking her tongue out as if she were just a child again.

Luis saw Luna step behind the Jeep and turned away. Victor and him had finally made eye contact. Neither of them seemed to want to talk with each other. Luis didn't understand what Victor hated him so much. He didn't do anything wrong; it wasn't his fault at all that a vampire attacked him. _Would it have been better if you daughter didn't do the right thing and just let that vampire kill me?!_

A low, growling noise came from behind the Jeep. Luis turned, and saw Luna's wolf form, a sight that he was very familiar with now. The two of them walked side by side, out into the deserted area. They stopped a few feet away from where everybody was. No one was sure what was going to happen.

Luis sat down in order to make level eye contact with Luna. He petted her head and then gave her his arm. Luis closed his eyes, adding pressure to his arm. Luna opened her mouth around his lower arm and then slowly closed her mouth around it. The pressure slowly built on Luis's arm. He couldn't scream, he couldn't show any signs of pain because he didn't want to freak Luna out about what was going on. She lifted her teeth from her arm, leaving a very distinct bite mark that was also very bloody. His teeth clenched, holding back the yell that he so badly wanted to release.

Chelsea was watching the two of them from a distance. She squinted when she saw that Luna had actually bitten him. Luis appeared to have collapsed and seemed to be struggling to get up. Chelsea ran out to where her friends were, trying to avoid looking at Luis's blood covered mark. She couldn't imagine a single person choosing to go through something this painful while they were considered perfectly sane. Luis was very different though; that much was made clear. Chelsea knelt down next to him and aided him in standing up.

"Thanks," Luis said in a sickly tone.

"Don't mention it," Chelsea told him, both of them standing erect. "Just be sure to take care of Luna, no matter what, understand."

Luis let out a very shallow laugh. "You don't need to tell me twice. I'll be okay. It is only but a scratch."

Chelsea laughed. "If you say so."

Chelsea stayed there with her friends, standing closely next to Luna. Luis was looking for the moon, which was somewhat higher than where it was when they first arrived at the spot. Luis lifted his arm, as if he was showing the moon that he was painfully bit. At first, it didn't seem like anything was going to happen. He only just stood there, trying his best to keep a straight face as the pain was becoming more and more intense. Luis wasn't expecting some kind of big show where a magic green circle appeared around him, but he was expecting something to happen.

Luis then let out a blood curdling scream!

It wasn't from the pain of the bite, which much was clear. Chelsea spotted his arm, and noticing that some of the blood on his arm was glowing. Noticing the shape of the glowing areas, Chelsea guessed that it was the outline of Luna's mark that was making the blood glow. Still yelling, Luis collapsed on all fours. Victor and Emily moved in closer to the body but Luna didn't allow anyone to go near him. A variety of noises was escaping from Luis's mouth. It was a mixture of yelling, snorting, and even barking.

His hair seemed to grow at a very rapid rate, covering his entire body. At the same time, his body was becoming much larger, ripping apart the clothes that were covering his body. His joints, muscles, and bones were also transforming. His voice changed, and the yelling had completely disappeared. Luis wanted to yell, but he physically wasn't able to. As his tail formed at the end of his body, he let out a howl that would echo for miles. His eyes were bright yellow and his fur was the same black of his hair. The First Transformation had been completed. From this day forth, Luis was a werewolf.

Chapter Twelve: Fight or Flight

Miles, his howl goes.

A warning to all over:

The moon will now rise.

Luis blinked for a few seconds, in disbelief on what had just happened. He was now at perfect eye level with Luna. His head shifted, trying to get a feel for his body. This was something that Luis wasn't expecting. He wished to move forward, but he couldn't do it. The only bits of muscle he could move were for him to shift his head. A whimper escaped him as he tried to move one of his paws. He was about to collapse to his side when Chelsea came to catch him at the last second.

"Luis, can you hear me?"

It was Luna's voice. He had been staring at her and her mouth didn't move at all. It was like her voice had a direct link inside Luis's head. She approached him slowly, careful of his movements. He wasn't quite sure how to communicate the same way that she was, so he simply nodded at her.

"We werewolves can communicate with each other; all you have to do is think it, but simply thinking it isn't enough. Just...think it into my mind. If you do that, then you should be able to talk to me as I am able to talk with you."

Luis wasn't quite sure what Luna was talking about. He didn't feel like he was simply imagining Luna speaking to him, but she seemed to be just talking in illogical circles. He gave it a try, looking straight at her. _Think it into her mind. Think it into her mind. Think it into her mind._

"The way you tried to explain this doesn't make any sense at all," Luis tried to tell her.

"Well, it worked didn't it," Luna told him, sounding slightly irritated.

"Wait! You actually heard what I said," Luis asked, still slightly confused about the whole process.

"Yep; looks like I'm not such a bad teacher, after all. Now all you need to do is to learn how to walk like one of us. It looks like the essential things that are passed down from each generation don't transfer over as good to those who are bitten."

Chelsea carefully watched the two werewolves interact with each other. From what she could gather by simply watching their body language, Luna was (poorly) trying to teach Luis how to walk on all fours. She understood how complicated it was, so she understood the frustration on both of their faces.

Victor felt on edge though. He didn't seem bothered by anything as they were driving up there, but now he seemed completely tense. Something else was now on his mind.

"Do you think these two are going to be alright," Chelsea spoke aloud, mainly just to verbalize her thoughts.

"There are worse people out there that Luna could have found," Victor commented. "That kid may be an idiot, but he's got guts."

Chelsea wasn't sure if Victor was actually complementing Luis.

Maka had become more and more frustrated by the day. She was on hunting duty with Drake and Karin, who seemed to have a good handle on the aspects of being a vampire. The only bright side of her current situation was that she was away from Light. Even in life, she did her best to avoid being stuck in closed spaces with him for long periods of time.

Maka was following behind Drake, stalking a group of teenagers. She knew what he wanted to do. They were going to kill them, and save one of them to become a vampire. Drake's family would soon become an army. It all seemed to contradict everything that they were being taught though. Humans were scum, they were filled with hateful thoughts and they deserved to die for the way they acted. If all of that were true, then why save one from the group and turn them into a vampire. Maka wanted an answer.

Karin had been controlling the entire group of teenagers for half a mile now. Her powers have grown so much that she was able to take control of more than one person at a time; all they needed to do was to stare at her in the eye, and they were hers to control. She was leading the group of them back to the vampire's hiding place, where they would complete the executions. Drakes sadistic smile would grow with every passing second, examining exactly who from the group he was going to "save".

Suddenly, a strange noise broke through the loud streets, only a noise that Maka could hear. It was a loud howling noise, one that sounded of a wolf. It caused every cell in her body to jump. She was surprised that no one else reacted the same way that she did. A warm feeling crawled through her body, the same kind of feeling she got when she saw Light kill that female vampire not too long ago. _But, it looks like no one else heard it_ , Maka told herself as they walked through the street. _Maybe it all was just inside my head._ She refused to tell anybody about what she heard; still trying to convince herself that she didn't hear anything.

The groups of teenagers were now at the entryway of the apartment complex that the vampires resided in. It appeared that Karin's magic was able to block out the senses of a human being as well; no human would sanely come into a place where it reeked of old blood. As Maka passed through the entry way, she passed by Light, who gleefully smiled at the thought of spilling fresh blood. Maka didn't find it right to kill anybody though; she never once added to the body count.

With the humans still in their trance, a girl with orange hair was the only one who broke away from the group. That was the one Drake had instructed Karin to break away from the group. Drake and Light broke into a flash, killing every human that was in their respective path. Blood stained their clothes as Light began to laugh. It all happened in a second, but it seemed to last for minutes inside the mind of Maka. It appeared to her that she was the only one who would stare at the faces of those who have died, trying to guess what they were thinking right before they met their fate.

"Why does she get saved," Maka asked. She hurried over to the girl with orange hair, who was still in the trance. "What if I killed her right now? What makes her so special that she becomes one of us?" Maka knew the true answer for Drake: power. It didn't matter to him who it was; he just wanted to add another toy to his collection. That was why Light and Maka were where they were now; it was luck of the draw.

"Redemption," Drake answered in a cool voice. He tore the girl away from Maka's clutches, injecting his poison into the girl's neck. The trance broke and the girl screamed. The pain was so intense that the orange haired girl passed out on the spot. "Remember what I've been telling you, these human beings are not worth the breath they breathe. Tell me though, how much better are you now that you became a vampire? She is now one of us because she has the ability to become better than any human being out there." He then went up to Maka, holding her neck tightly. "And if you ever question me again, I will be more than glad to have you join the humans and allow you to die as well, you ungrateful brat!"

Before releasing Maka from his grip, Drake spat on her face, throwing her straight to the cold ground. Karin picked up the orange girl's body, following behind Light and Drake. The only one who seemed to stay behind was Alexis. She didn't want to believe that Drake would be so rough on Maka; it wasn't possible. _No, she deserved what happened to her_ , Alexis told herself, justifying his actions. _You don't question your leader when you're in the middle of a battle. He's doing this so we can live happy and free._

Noises were escaping from Maka's mouth. To anyone else, they would have guess that Maka was crying. It was impossible for tears to flow down her cheeks, but she could remember what it felt like. She wanted to run away, to run out of the complex and to never return to this place again. Nothing was keeping her here, but why couldn't she leave? It was the imbedded fear that was instilled inside her body because of Drake. She feared that he would come after her, find her, and then end her life. For now, it was much safer for her to play his games. Even if it was just for a little longer, she was going to keep living.

Another howl broke through her thoughts. Out of reflex, she jumped all the way across the room. By the time she had reached the end of the hallway, Maka had realized that she was, again, hearing things that probably weren't really there. She looked at Alexis, who was looking at her in shock.

"Did you hear it too," Maka asked Alexis. If her heart were beating again, it would have skipped a beat at this moment. Maka was hoping that she wasn't going crazy, that other people could hear the howling. Alexis's face didn't change, and Maka's heart would have sunk.

"What are you talking about," Alexis asked her.

"That howling noise," Maka urged. "You had to have heard it; that's why you're making that face!"

"I didn't hear anything," Alexis told her. "I'm making the face because of you. You're flying!"

Maka looked down and noticed that she was levitating three feet off of the ground. This wasn't an ability that frequently showed up in vampires, that was what Alexis was taught anyway. No one seemed to see Maka as anything special, just some extra muscle to add to the body of their group. It was only Maka who couldn't tell what big of a deal it was that she was floating off of the ground. Light and Drake had returned through the elevator, Drake stopping dead in his tracks. Light didn't look as if he was in the mood for laughing when he saw that his sister was floating.

"Get down from there, you idiot," Light ordered his sister. Drake lifted his arm, telling the young man to stop.

"Leave her be," Drake said in a still voice. Light was outraged; he couldn't understand why either Drake or Alexis saw Maka's little magic trick as anything special. To him, she would always be the same weak little girl who didn't have the capacity to do anything by herself. "Maka, tell me, when did you find out you could do this?"

Maka bit her lip. She wasn't too sure if she wanted to explain the whole truth of what had happened to her, that she jumped because she was hearing howling noises in her head. Whether you're a human or a vampire, hearing noises in your head didn't appear to be a good sign. That all being said, she knew that she was terrible at fibbing, no matter if it was big or small, and she already wasn't one of Drake's favorite people. Lying right now would probably just make things worse for her.

"I j-jumped," Maka answered, doing her best to get her story straight. "It was when you guys left; I heard this strange howling noise. It caused me to jump across the room, and I guess my powers just kicked in."

"Is that true," Drake asked Alexis.

"Most of it," Alexis confessed to Drake. "She seemed to be afraid of something, but I didn't hear any howling."

"I heard it, I swear!" Maka exclaimed to all of them.

"Maka's going mad," Light mocked, finding his reason to laugh at his sister. No one else seemed to be taking it the same way though.

"That's enough, Light," Drake ordered. His laughing stopped at once, his face now becoming hard as stone. Amazed, Maka could tell that Drake actually did believe what she was saying. He was deep in thought, pondering over what was happening to her. "What you probably heard was a werewolf. They howl when they're getting ready to attack." He turned his sights to Light, whose arms were crossed. "Make sure that the perimeter is safe."

Light left without saying a word. It was obvious why he was angry; Drake had betrayed him, and for his nobody sister no less! Maka worried for anyone who would crossed Light's path, whether it be a human, vampire, or even a werewolf.

"How come I can hear them howl," Maka asked. "They have to be far away, I mean, Alexis just said that she couldn't hear the howling."

"It's a defensive ability," Drake said, verbalizing the thoughts that were going through his mind. "If we know that someone wants to attack us, we may just have the upper hand. Their surprise attack would crumble and we can take them out. This needs further looking into." His voice changed into that of a military leader. "Maka, be sure to tell us whenever you hear the howling again, do you understand me. You will be staying inside every night until I say otherwise, to hone your abilities; do I make myself clear?"

"Yes sir," Maka answered out of reflex.

Chapter Thirteen: Exposed

Their paths have been linked.

Accidents have taken place.

All lies are shattered.

It took Luis a full week of nightly training sessions with Luna and Victor for him to get used to being in his werewolf form. Luna was mostly surprised that her father had decided to help him with this in the first place, causing her to search for a hidden agenda behind his actions. Never once in her past could she remember her father doing anything for the good of her, only for her brothers. Her heart wanted to believe that this was his way of making up for all the bad things that he had done to her, but her brain found that too implausible to happen.

At the beginning of December and Victor had finished his training of Luis. Although everyone felt that Luis wasn't even close to being ready, Victor was going to have Luis do some patrolling of the city. Luna wasn't too sure about how she wanted to feel about this new idea.

"He said he wanted to be a werewolf, then he's going to be a werewolf," Victor told those who opposed his idea, which was Emily and, to Luna's surprise, Phil. "I'm not going to allow him to think he can just skate by with his life now. I've talked it over with him and he said that he wants to help us in any way he can."

"And what if that vampire group that's been killing everybody decides to show up on his first night out," Phil asked. "He's not strong enough to fight off a vampire yet."

"Just hold off a little longer dear," Emily pleaded.

"He says he's okay with it, so there's no reason why we should be arguing about this. He's going to go out there tonight, and that's final."

"We have every reason to fight about this," Phil protested. He shot a look at Luna, amazed that she had kept quiet through the whole mess. "Who's going with him?"

"Luna," Victor answered. "He seems to progress better whenever she's helping him, and she needs to make up that time she wasted watched over his house."

"Then I'm going too." Phil told him. "Someone has to make sure that these kids don't get themselves killed."

Phil left the living room without giving anyone else time to speak. Luna did her best to hide her smile; this was the first time in a long time that she felt like someone in this family really care about her. She didn't quite understand Phil's change of attitude, but she truly appreciated his "kind" words. Luna was hoping to stay on his good side for the rest of the day; she had known that Luis would go on his first patrol mission tonight, so she had already invited Chelsea to tag along with them. Luna was hoping that inviting her wouldn't cause too much trouble and hoped that Phil would be able to behave himself around her.

Descending from the stairs was Rick, who appeared as if he had just gotten out of bed. Lately, he had been sleeping in every other night, which wasn't usual behavior for a werewolf. Finals were coming up for the college students, so everyone assumed that he was studying one night and sleeping the next. That's what his story was, but everyone knew better. Rick wasn't studying so he could do well in class – grades weren't too important to him – but he was keeping his mind off of other things.

Although Rick was a year older than Luna, he seemed to have the personality of someone younger. Since the beginning of high school, he had a crush on a girl named Emma. He worked hard to have the courage to ask her out, but every time he built it up, it all seem to melt away at one point or another. He was enthralled when he heard that they were going to the same college, giving him some extra time to ask her out. However, Emma hadn't returned to class after Thanksgiving break. All of their classmates that she became ill, but Rick knew better than to believe that.

Emma wasn't someone who would miss class over anything; he remembered that she was forced by school officials to leave the school officials back in high school because she had the flu and broke down crying, begging for them to reconsider. She was a straight-A student, so missing classes on this crucial point in their first year wasn't a smart option. It was like she had disappeared completely from the face of the earth, or something much worse happened to her.

Working was a distraction for Rick. He didn't want to spend his time worrying about Emma because he would just eventually go crazy. He studied to keep his mind on other things and slept to escape reality. Very rarely did he speak to anybody, and he didn't want to begin thinking about werewolves and vampires.

Luna stayed in her room until well close to midnight, working on her essay for her English class. At best, she figured that she would get a "C" because she just didn't care for the works of Jane Austen, no matter how much her teacher tried to persuade her otherwise. She still had two more weeks until the end of the semester. Every single one of her teachers was piling on the work, each one more ridiculous and excessive than the next.

"Let's go," Phil said to Luna in a stern voice.

Phil and Luna hurried downstairs and went to their backyard and changed. Phil stretched before he allowed Luna to lead the way to Luis's house. The two of them jumped into the backyard, where they were greeted by Chelsea and Luis, both of them in their wolf forms as well. Phil stared at the extra-wolf, taking a little while to figure out her identity. Simply looking into her eyes were enough.

"You don't mind if I come along, do you," Chelsea asked, her voice now very frail.

"I invited you, so it's fine," Luna quickly answered. "Is that okay with you, Phil?"

"As long as she doesn't hold us back," Phil responded, his emotions masked. "We're going downtown, so that means we're going to be running for a while. Are you sure that you two can keep up?" His attention was directed to Luis and Chelsea.

"No problem," Luis answered in a cocky voice.

"I can handle it," Chelsea told them, hoping she can keep her word.

Chelsea had been changing into her wolf form more and more since Luis's First Transformation. It was mostly because Luna and Luis would sneak around on the weekends and in the afternoons, helping out Luis in every way they could. Chelsea had become rusty, but she was slowly becoming better at it.

"Let's go then," Phil told them.

One by one, the wolves followed Phil out of the back yard and they ran into the street. There were no lights illuminating and no one was outside for any reasons. The four of them ran in a diamond shape, Phil at the front, Luis and Luna taking up the middle and Chelsea hanging close in the rear. The wind flowing through their coats, Luis was the one who was enjoying the sprint the most. Excited, he let out a mighty howl, but quickly ended it when Luna shot him a nasty look. The last thing they needed tonight was for animal control to come and search for a mad dog.

Light's life had completely changed in a flash. He couldn't believe that everything would have the capacity to completely shatter in one night, all due to one person. Before, it was only a sibling grudge, but he truly hated Maka now. She had become the apple of everyone's eye simply because she could fly. Light knew he was stronger and a much better fighter than her; he decided that he wasn't going to aid her when she got attacked by enemies who were stronger than her.

To occupy his time lately, he decided to start manipulating the new girl. Her case was very special. Most vampires don't remember what happened to them right before they were bitten, but this girl was very different. She couldn't remember anything at all! No one knew the reason why, but she couldn't remember her name, where she lived, or anybody significant in her life. For all intents and purposes, they named the girl Norma, since it sounded so much like "no one".

Norma was older than Light, but that didn't stop him from trying to make her his. Even with his distrust for Drake, they still shared many similarities. Norma was going to be his Alexis; a girl only there for his convenience. He didn't love her, he didn't have the capacity to love anyone, but he easily knew how to manipulate someone into thinking he did. Within days, Norma was wrapped around his finger. With her memory gone, Light had become her rock, keeping her attached to reality and sanity.

In the middle of the thirteenth floor, Maka was showing off how well she improved her flight abilities. Everyone seemed absolutely amazed by what she could do, performing flips through the air and floating in place. At one point though, Maka paused dead in her tracks. She wasn't focused and began to fall. Karin saw this and hurried to catch her. Light let out a chuckle at the sight, Norma shyly joining in with him.

"What happened," Alexis called out, checking if Maka was alright.

"Where's Drake," Maka called out in fear.

"He's out hunting, you know that," Alexis told her. "Is something wrong?"

"The howling!" Maka bellowed. "I heard it again. He told me to tell him when I heard the werewolves howling again. We have to go find him!"

"No, you're staying here," Alexis told her. "You and Karin need to stay here. I'm going to take Light and Norma."

"Finally, we have some action," Light exclaimed, as he avoided the elevator all together and began jumping down the stairs.

The werewolves rested once they reached the outskirts of the downtown area. They paced the perimeter slowly, doing their best not to draw attention to themselves. Phil was leading the pack, doing his best to keep focused. They followed him into what appeared to be a deserted part of downtown. It was a bunch of old homes, each one looking as if they were ready to cave in at any second. No one roamed these streets during the nights, for legends spread that ghosts of serial killers and drug users haunted this area. There was even an arsonist who had foolishly locked himself inside one of the houses he was burning.

"Be on your guard," Phil said, letting out a low growl. "Can you feel them?"

Everyone felt a strange feeling in the pits of their stomachs; a sense of nervousness and unease. It was built into every single one of them, to tell them that danger wasn't too far away. Luis moved to the rear of the group, where Chelsea was also standing.

The werewolves turned the corner and saw a car sitting in the middle of the street. The windows were tinted, but it was too new to have been here all this time. There were some muffled noises coming from the car, shaking from one side to another. The shaking stopped and the car door burst open. There was a shrill scream coming from the car as a woman, drenched in her own blood tried to escape.

The woman didn't make it too far though. A hooded figure came out from the car following the woman. He grabbed onto the woman's throat and crushed it with his bare hands. The screaming ceased and the woman's body never moved again. The hooded man threw the body to the floor as he began to drink her blood.

Phil attacked the hooded man by tackling him, letting out a loud bark. The man was caught off guard, being taken down by Phil with ease.

"Drake!" Phil exclaimed.

Phil had obviously gotten a good look at the face of the man who was under the hood. It was one that he had seen many times in the past. It was fortunate for the werewolves that Drake was unable to listen in on the minds of those who were supernatural, but the rest of the pack could hear what he was saying. Chelsea and Luis had been filled in on Alexander's group, but neither of them would have figured that anyone from the group would have attacked an innocent person.

"Stop you idiot," Luna called out as she saw that Luis running towards the body.

Luis refused to listen though. He ran towards the vampires, ready to prove himself as strong as anyone else. As soon as Luis reached his body, something had stopped him. Someone else had attacked the oncoming wolf, saving Drake from a second werewolf at the perfect time. Phil and Drake had been struggling for a while, Phil trying to get a good chunk of Drake's face ripped off. Drake channeled all of the strength he had and pushed Phil off of himself. As Phil tried to regain balance, Drake was already on his feet once more. Appearing behind him was a small group of his followers, including the one that had attacked Luis. Luna hurried to Luis's side, making sure that he was okay.

"You're such an idiot!" Luna yelled at him. "Why did you have to do that? Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," Luis answered, his ego hurt much more than his head did.

"Well," Drake said in a cool voice, as if everything was perfectly fine, "it would seem that Maka's powers are quite astounding. It took you all long enough to find us, didn't it? Now, what to do with you; we can't just let you waltz out of here without any consequences, now can we? Do you wish to commit to the same fate as Erika did when she returned to us?"

It had suddenly pieced together inside Luna's mind. "The killed her," Luna exclaimed as they took their place behind Phil.

Phil was examining the group of vampires, their faces exposed to the world. He recognized Karin and Alexis, but the others he had never seen. He zoomed in on one of the girls though, the one with the orange hair. He had seen her before, but not with Alexander. She stood timidly behind the rest of the group, obviously not ready to fight. It was her face that was very familiar to him, but he couldn't quite pin point where he saw her from. He thought back to his brother, and then everything seemed to click.

"It's Emma!" Phil exclaimed, letting out a large bark at the vampires. "That girl who disappeared that Rick cares for so much. They got a hold of her."

None of the vampires had the ability to hear what the vampires were thinking, and the wolves avoided any eye contact with Karin. One look and they were done for. All the vampires heard was Phil's loud barking pointed right at Norma. Her body began to shake behind Maka, too afraid to fight.

"You're not even worth the effort," Drake taunted at the wolves. "I'm not going to settle for small pups like you. Consider this your only warning: This is our town now. Either you let us do what we were created to do or we will kill you the next time we see you."

Luis was ready to jump in and attack the vampires. He didn't care if the cocky blond one that had taken him down in one strike, Luis was ready for anything now. Before Luis could make a move, the vampires ran at neck-breaking speed, evading their enemies for one more day. Phil swore loudly as he ordered them to return home.

No one dared to cross Phil. At this moment, he had reminded Luna much of her father, not just in their physical appearance, but in their reactions as a leader. They ran in a diamond formation, everyone running with as much energy as they could muster. Humans can run at their maximum speed for six seconds at a time, but werewolves had the stamina to go much further much longer.

Chapter Fourteen: Plans

Separate plots are formed.

The agreement has been killed.

Brink of all-out war.

The next morning, Phil, Luna, Luis, and Chelsea were silently sitting inside the Estrella's living room. They had sat there silently ever since they returned to the house. No one knew how to break the news they had recently discovered. In one night, it seems like their reality had been shattered into pieces. Victor, Emily, and Rick came downstairs at the same time (Kara was still sound asleep in her room), puzzled by those who were just sitting in the living room. Emily spotted that Luis's left arm had been cut, although not deeply.

"What happened," Victor said, ignoring the fact that Chelsea was in the room.

"I told you they would attack us," Phil said in a low voice. "The vampires, Alexander's group; they're the ones who are going around killing everybody. We saw them doing it."

"Erika must have alerted them that you were coming," Emily insisted.

"Erika is dead." Phil told them, rising up from the couch. "Drake told us himself. And ... there's something else."

"Well, tell us," Victor spat.

Phil wasn't quite sure how to find the words. Rick had been with him through everything since the day they were born. Now he had to tell his best friend the worst news he could possibly tell him. Luna stood up, knowing how hard it was for Phil to say.

"We found Emma," Luna answered, her voice going soft. "They turned her into one of them. She's a vampire now."

Rick's heart sank, going completely black. All of his hard work, it had all now amounted to absolutely nothing. There was no way to turn back into just a regular human once you became a vampire. It took much of his strength to remain standing, but he didn't hold back his tears. This was the only time in his life that he had ever cried.

"Are you sure of what you saw," Victor urged out of them. "Think! Could you have been mistaken?"

"We're all sure," Phil answered. "Alexander's group, they were feeding off of an innocent woman. They broke the contract."

"Contract," Luis and Chelsea both asked.

Phil adjusted his body to where the two of them were sitting. It seemed like obvious information that they should have been brief with, but he knew that even small things could be overlooked.

"Before many of us were born, Alexander met with my father," Phil began to explain. "Alexander told my father that he wasn't like most vampires; that he cared for humans. He wanted to get rid of those who didn't value human life, the real monsters. They made a treaty that day that neither of them was able to cause lasting harm to the other as long as each side kept their word. The vampires were to only kill off criminals, because they needed to feed, and transform others into vampires in life saving situations. Part of that deal was that we couldn't know where their headquarters is located, and even if we found it, we are forbidden to enter it. That is, until they attack an innocent person, consciously or unconsciously. That makes them fair game."

"And how do you expect them to still stand by the treaty," Luis asked, dumbfounded.

"You'll be surprised by how powerful magic really is," Chelsea said, making her presence clear in the room. "It's an all knowing force; once you make a magical contract, it all becomes bound together. Until one person breaks the contract, everything still stands. You can lie to whoever you want as many times as you wish, but magic is something that can never be lied to; it knows exactly what's going on."

"So, now what do we do," Luna asked.

"What do you mean 'what do we do'," Rick spoke, his voice trembling. "We do what we have to: We take them out. They need to pay for what they've done."

"Rick!" Emily exclaimed, now holding her son.

"Are you ready to accept the consequences?" Victor told his son, his tone harsh and unrelenting. "That girl you pined over so much, she's now a vampires. Do you accept that? Do you accept that you have to kill her as well? It's very clear to you, she's the enemy now. Do you have what it takes to kill her?"

Everyone gasped. Luna had never heard her father sound so callous about anything before. Rick released his mother and faced his father, his anger burning. Everyone was standing back, fearing that he would transform right in front of them. Rick wanted to strike his father; he knew he deserved. Rick hated everything! His body jerked, fighting off his transformation. Desperate, he turned and struck the solid wall next to him, making a hole that was much bigger than his fist. His body had stopped fidgeting, causing everyone to be calm for only a second.

Rick ran out of the house, Phil following after him. Luna tried to get up but one look from her father caused her to turn into stone. She held tightly onto Luis's arm, refusing to cry in front of her father. The noises were muffled. There was a lot of yelling coming from the outside, taunts back and forth. This had been the first time in a long time that the two twins have ever fought over anything. A car door loudly slammed and then they heard the sound of glass shattering. There was a couple of more seconds of loud fighting, then the sound of tire screeches and a car finally drove away in the distance.

Phil entered the house, shaking his head. He then turned to his father, who didn't seem affected by anything that was going on. Phil was on emotional auto-pilot, rushing over to his father. At first, it looked as if he were about to strike. Instead, Phil grabbed the collar of Victor's shirt, and pinned hid directly to the part of the wall that Rick hadn't already smashed.

"Why did you have to say that to him," Rick screamed right at his father's face. Emily tried tugging on Phil's arms but they wouldn't budge even a centimeter. "Do you have any idea what's going on in your own family. Or do you just not give a damn anymore?! Get with the program, you old bastard, these are real people with real feelings. You can't treat them like that! Not everyone in the world is as cold hearted as you! You need to learn to know what's best for everyone instead of your own damn self. Are you even listening to me?!"

Victor's eyes never met with Phil's. Phil's teeth were clenched, with his fists clenching harder with every passing word. To Luna, it looked as if Victor was bored and uninterested in what his own son had to say. She saw Victor playing with is fingernails and making small spitting noises as Phil was making his point clear. Phil wanted to strike him; he wish he had it in him to hit his father in the middle of his face. He took in a deep breath, counting to ten inside his head. He released Victor from his grip and threw him to the side.

"You're not even worth the effort," Phil said to his father. He then turned to the three young adults who were sitting on the couch. "Luna, Luis, Chelsea; let's get going. You don't want to be here for when the cops come, do you?" Out of context, this all seemed like a family discussion gone completely wrong. Phil assumed that a neighbor would have called the police on them after hearing all the yelling and property destruction. All three of them got up and walked towards the door in unison. Before Chelsea walked out the door, Phil grabbed onto her wrist. Her body shook. "You're a good kid. He doesn't know what he missed out on. I'm sorry I haven't been a good big brother. Can you ever forgive me?"

"Um, sure, of course," Chelsea answered, her voice trembling. "Thank you, Phil."

The four of them left the house, Phil slamming the door behind them. The only thing that Phil regretted about it all was forgetting to grab the keys to the Jeep. His mind was on other things, mostly on where his brother was headed. It was obvious that he was going to go after the vampires, but no one knew where to start looking. Due to the treaty with Alexander, they didn't know the location of the vampire's hideout.

"What are we going to do now," Luna asked as they walked in the direction of Luis's house.

"Chelsea, do you mind if Luna and I stayed at your house for the time being," Phil asked.

"Of course," Chelsea said, blushing. "You all are welcome at my place anytime."

"Thanks," Phil told her. Chelsea pulled her hood over her head, doing her best to hide her embarrassment. "Now, we just need to find a way to track down Rick. He'll die without us."

Light felt that he and Drake were finally seeing eye to eye once again. The night's incidents had gotten Drake's mind going in motion, scheming their next movements. Everyone was hanging out of the thirteenth floor, waiting to for Drake to come up with a plan. The werewolves knew that they have feasted on innocent humans. It wasn't something that they could easily brush of or just tell them that they were mistaken, they had seen it with their own eyes.

Drake knew that it was his own fault that they were caught; he had gotten too cocky with his attacks. The treaty that Alexander and the leader of the werewolves forged so long ago had been shattered, meaning that they could now be a target. Werewolves weren't cowards, and they weren't idiots either, that much he knew. He felt that they had at least a while before the werewolves would find this place. It would be smart to keep everyone inside for the next few days, only leaving to feed when they absolutely had to. It was the only way to ensure that they would stay alive for that much longer.

"But where's the fun in that," Drake asked himself, a cool smile emerging across his face.

The broken treaty was now out in the open, meaning that they were free! There was no reason to go around hiding it all or blaming it on new vampires or the drug cartel. The vampires have also become more evenly numbered to the werewolves. Hiding would be probably the dumbest idea Drake would come up with. He didn't want to hide his group; he wanted to create more followers for him to control, to create a new world where they ruled over the humans. The vampires were going to take over. That was what he wanted in the end.

"We're all going to be leaving tonight," Drake informed them as he rose to the middle of the room. Everyone gathered around him, ready to listen to their orders. "The werewolves are now aware that the treaty has been broken, the one I broke some time ago. I take responsibility for that. However, ask yourselves, where you would be if I didn't take their lives and chose you to be in this flock. You have all grown so beautifully in this short amount of time, stronger, faster, and smarter. You do not deserve to live in this world, run by those who are the lowest of the low!

"Alexander used to speak of a world where we lived to protect these humans. Well, I am here to tell you that his dream is dead, much like him. If he were alive, he would have come back for his revenge by now. His wishes were as much of a sham as he was. You are now free to roam the nights and to take the blood that is rightfully yours. There are those who will fight you, who will tell you that you are wrong, but that is a lie. This is a direct order: kill all of those who dare to oppose you and your mighty strength. And if there are those who share these ideals, then their wretched human souls may have a chance to be saved! To those, I tell you to convert them into what you have become. Come sunset, we will enter this town, and take what we have the right to take!"

A thunderous applause followed Drake's words. There was cheer, claps, and even whistling coming from his followers. They had been engulfed by his words and drawn in by the feeling of family and belonging. The one who soaked in all of this was Light, who was indeed the loudest of them all. The Drake he knew and admired had indeed returned.

"I can't wait to meet face to face with one of those werewolves," Karin cheered. "I've come up with some very useful illusions that I know will break them into pieces."

"I don't care who lights the match the burns down the entire world," Light spoke with pride, "as long as I'm there to help spread the fire."

"Come, Alexis," Drake said, coming down from his mental pedestal. Alexis wrapped herself around her master, unaware of her movements. "Let us celebrate before sunset."

The group's whistling and hollering grew much louder. Drake's actions inspired Light, who had complete manipulation over Norma, to do the same. Both of the couples rushed downstairs, both of the males simply giving strength to the control they had over their partner. Maka and Karin were left to do whatever they wanted. Karin had noticed that Maka was flying through the air, seemingly out of joy. That was when Karin had come up with an idea.

"Hey Maka," Karin said, with a cunning smile, "how about we play a fun little game on the werewolves. What do you say?"

"Sounds interesting," Maka sneered, floating down to properly talk to Karin. "What kind of idea do you have in mind, may I ask?"

Luis's parents weren't used to him having guests over, besides Luna, of course. Ashley was especially amazed by the variety of people he had coming over just to hang out with him. Everyone did their best not to discuss too much about the vampires around Luis's family; Luis didn't know how to explain to his family about the existence of vampires, werewolves, witches, and who knows what else. As far as anyone knew, Luis's family was completely oblivious to him becoming a werewolf. Discussing such matters amongst each other became much more difficult when Ashley would come in every five minutes to flirt with Phil.

"Leave us alone," Luis yelled at his sister, as they tried to talk in the living room.

"I'm just asking him a few questions about the finals that are coming up," Ashley said in a high pitched girly voice, something that Luis had never heard her speak in before.

"But, I don't have any classes with you," Phil added in.

"He doesn't know that," Ashley whispered, pointing at Luis.

"I told you to leave us alone!" Luis exclaimed.

Luna grabbed onto Luis's arm as Ashley ran out of the living room area. They didn't need Luis's transforming into a werewolf in the middle of his living room with his entire family here simply because his sister was annoying them. He controlled his breathing as he slowly sat down, Luna planting a small kiss on his cheek. Chelsea laughed at the silly face Luis made; she felt so weird being in a place surrounded by people who had truly accepted her.

"So, what are we going to do," Luna asked everyone in a hushed tone. "We have to go looking for Rick, that's a given. We can't tell him to go back home though. And what are we going to do about the vampires?"

"I say we just take everything as it comes," Phil told them. "I'm positive that Rick is going to be looking for the vampires, so I'm sure that we can find him roaming around downtown tonight. He may end up actually finding the vampire's hiding spot for all we know. If that does end up happening, we'll have to help him fight all of them off."

Rick did not feel well saying his last statement. He did want to extinguish the vampires; for the past few months, they have been making his life a living hell. He worked much harder to make sure the city was safe, as well as being distracted almost every day during his classes. And now they had turned his brother's crush into one of them. He could only imagine what was going through Rick's mind right now, not only knowing that Emma had become a vampire, but he had to kill her in order to save other lives. Phil knew that he had to be the one to extinguish her life; Rick would probably hate him for the rest of his life because of it, but it had to be done.

"So, we're just going to go out looking for him every night, hoping to solve one of our problems without any real plan," Chelsea asked.

"Do you have any better ideas," Phil asked.

Chelsea wanted to say something but caught herself. She didn't have a plan either, but she still felt that winging the entire thing would most likely just get them killed. None of them wished for this to happen, but they felt as if it were their responsibility to stop it. This wasn't something they were supposed to do alone, but they chose to do it. Not for the honor or glory, but simply because they knew that it was the right thing to do. An evil needed to be vanquished, and they were ready to give up their lives to show the vampires that their wicked ways were not going to take any more innocent lives.

Chapter Fifteen: Confrontation

The perfect nightfall.

Soulless creatures stand and wait

for their only foes.

Tonight's sunset seemed to capture Luis's eyes. Maybe it was because of the pressure he was under, but he felt that he needed to remember this particular sunset. He watched as the color of the sky transformed right in front of him. He made a wish, simply hoping that if anything were to go wrong, that Luna would at least be able to make it out alive. He would be able to live with a few scratches, cuts, and maybe a few limbs severed from his body, but he wasn't too sure if he could continue on without Luna. Sure, that seemed too soon to say, but he felt that to be the truth.

Luna had made a similar wish on the same sunset. Holding onto Luis, she simply hoped that Luis wouldn't do anything foolish or reckless when it came to dealing with the vampires. She looked at him, not even recognizing him as the boy she met earlier that year in the library. Her plan had worked, taking him from being the small boy who could barely speak and turning him into a great young man. She was proud that she was able to call him her boyfriend.

Chelsea watched the two of them, smiling at how close she seemed. It was only recently that she was starting to really become a regular person, instead of someone in the background that everyone ignored. She no longer felt the need to fight for her father's approval, because she clearly saw that he wasn't worth that time or effort. For the first time in her life, Chelsea decided that she was going to live life for herself and not care what anyone thought of her. Her wish upon the sunset was to be just like Luna: independent, strong, and have an amazing partner who would do anything for her.

As for Phil, all he cared about was his brother. He imagined Rick in his mind, he was probably angry and waiting around to find his first vampire. Phil wished that his brother was safe and that he would listen to their reasoning when they found him. There was no "if" for Phil; he knew that he was going to find Rick and bring him back home. Phil and Rick had been friends for their entire lives; he didn't want that to end because of the soulless vampires.

As the sun hid behind the mountain range, Luna, Phil, and Chelsea made their leave from the Medina house. They were to return in the middle of the night for Luis, and begin their exploration. They had so many things to do, and they barely had any time to complete them. Luis wondered if they were truly as strong as they claimed to be. As he waited in his dark room, Luis prepared his body. He wasn't going to be taken down like he had been the previous night. It was a cheap shot, one that could have been avoided if he was a little more on guard. Luis knew that he had been treating all of this as if it was a game, but now he realized that there were real lives at stake. There was no more time for playing; he was going to do whatever it took to protect his friends.

Luis spent the time in his room meditating and preparing himself for battle. He did this until midnight. He envisioned himself as his wolf form, running with his friends by his side, ready to take down the vampires. He watched his hand move, his brain telling him to bend his fingers at certain times. Luis saw that, in itself, was its own brand of magic. It too, worked with logic, and helped the whole world make sense of itself. As long as he was able to move his arms freely, he knew that he had the power to do anything he wanted. This was his life now, the life of a werewolf, and he had to be ready to embrace it.

At exactly midnight, Luis spotted the trio hop into his backyard. He had dressed himself in a robe with nothing underneath. Luna, Phil, and Chelsea were already in their wolf forms, so he knew he had to hurry. He hurried down the stairs, careful not to awaken any of his family members. After closing the back door, he changed into his werewolf form, careful to take off his robe at the appropriate time. Everyone seemed energized tonight. They all were feeling the same thing: They felt as if they were a part of something important, that they were chosen by the Universe itself to take down this evil.

"I'm telling you guys, don't doubt the power of magic," Chelsea informed them as they began running down the street. "All of this can't just be coincidence, right? You can't tell me that after all we've seen, that all of this happened merely by accident."

They all knew that Chelsea was speaking the truth. Whatever was in charge of the workings of the Universe must have had a soft spot for them. It made them only feel more empowered on what they were going to do. They felt like they couldn't be harmed at all because everything was taken care of. The scratch on Luis's arm was only minor and it had already healed up half way through the day. Luis felt completely revitalized; his running became more ecstatic and his eyes burnt with pride. Phil looked over at the young man, the boy that he had doubted ever since they met not so long ago.

"Looks like you can pick good guys after all," Phil teased his sister. "It's a good thing too. I was getting worried there; wondering why you couldn't get a boyfriend."

"Shut up!" Luna told her brother as the entire group laughed.

The four of them reached the downtown area, ready to start in the same place they did last time. As they got closer to the middle of the area, they would have to be more careful. It was one of those nights where people let their inhibitions melt away into a shot glass of vodka. Of course, it was also the perfect place for blood thirsty vampires to find some new prey.

Walking through the abandoned street didn't feel any different for any of them. They were all on their guard, ready to fight when the time came. Luis wanted to take down the blond vampire that had attacked him, to show him that what happened last night was simply a lucky strike. Every single one of them seemed to have a specific target in mind, although none of them knew what they were going to do if they faced the orange haired girl. Whoever killed her would probably face a lifetime of hatred. Even Phil was having cold feet about his decision.

They turned the corner, staring back at the abandoned car. All the windows seemed to be completely shattered, probably by those who passed it in the day time to see if they could find something valuable. All that seemed left was the rusted metal skeleton, which was barely standing on its own anyway. Perched on top of the car was a small figure covered in black. Phil knew now not to attack carelessly. They all slowly approached the car, listening to the figure on top of the car humming to herself.

"Jack and Jill went up the hill, to fetch a pail of water," The voice cooed.

One by one, six more figures jumped from their hiding places. They landed on their feet, creating a circle around the werewolves. They came closer and closer, causing the circle to become smaller. No one wanted to strike first; everyone was waiting for the other side to make the first move. The figure on the car stood up and took off its hood. It was Karin, her face revealing no emotion, yet her eyes were wide open.

"But Jack died as he fell down, and Jill masked her tears with laughter," Karin taunted.

"Don't look her in the eye!" Phil reminded his group.

It was Drake who finally made the first attack. He came sprinting at the werewolves, ready to strike Chelsea. Phil intercepted the blow, using the force of his body to throw Drake a distance back. Phil went in to take down Drake as the fight completely broke lose. Chelsea had her sights set on the girl who seemed to be barely floating off the ground. As Chelsea came running after the girl, she barked, causing the floating girl to shiver and fall to the floor. Chelsea was ready to take a bite off of the girl, but the girl narrowly escaped the attack.

"Quit messing around Maka," Karin told the floating vampire.

"I didn't mean for it to happen," The girl told her. "Just hurry up with your side of the deal."

Luna was caught in a brawl with Light. Every time Luna went in to try to bite the vampire, he would swiftly move out of the way. With every miss, Light's laughter would become louder and louder. Luna didn't understand why this guy was laughing; she couldn't tell if he was simply taunting her or if he seriously found this whole situation entertaining. Light ran head first at Luna, tackling her to the ground. His laughing became more maniacal as he had Luna pinned to the cold cement. Luna barked at the young man, only to be greeted with more laughter.

"Sorry to disappoint you, but I'm not as useless as my sister," Light told the wolf.

Luis was caught up in his own battle with Alexis. She was puzzled why the werewolf was attack her in the first place. She was using her power, to emit the scent of the one thing that attracted him. What Alexis didn't know was that the scent that was flowing into his nostrils was the smell of Luna's skin. There was only one Luna, and she was helping him take down the vampires. He wasn't blinded by love; instead, he was being fuelled by it. Luis snapped at Alexis, and latched his teeth upon her arm. He ripped it clean off, tossing it into the darkness. Luis pivoted his vision, and saw that Luna was on her back, pinned down by the vampire who attacked him the previous night.

"Luna!" Luis cried own, diverting his attention from Alexis to Light.

"Stop, you idiot," Luna instructed him. "I'm going to be fine; do what you need to do."

Luis paused. "I will," he told her.

Luis ran straight into Light. The force was so great; Luis threw Light's body half way across the street. Light had his nails dug into Luna, so when Luis pushed him off, it created some gashes in Luna's side. Light got the worst part of the deal though; his smashed into the rusted car. His entire right arm was almost completely severed from his body. Light was clenching his teeth, his breathing becoming much harsher. Luna was staggering onto her feet.

"I could have handled him by myself," Luna informed Luis. "You needed to take care of Alexis. You could have finished her off.

"I wasn't going to let him hurt you," Luis told her.

Their conversation ended there. Luis was attacked by Karin, who was pinning him down. He refused to open his eyes, knowing how powerful she was. Karin reached inside her coat and pulled out a small dagger. Swiftly, she stabbed it to Luis's left side. Luis howled in pain, tears beginning to form. He couldn't keep his eyes closed any longer. Karin was staring right at him, waiting for her chance to attack.

Reveal to me; show me what I want to know!

Luis was no longer in the middle of the street fighting off the vampires. He was back in his room, breathing heavily. Checking his left arm, it no longer seemed to be bleeding. In fact, there seemed to be no trace of a wound at all. He hurried out of bed to examine the house. It was a dark and stormy night, in the distance, he heard a dog howling. Luis didn't feel like he was walking through the house. It was like he was gliding, like a ghost across the floor.

The first room he entered was Ashley's room, right next to the stairs. The window to her room was completely smashed in and the posters in the room seemed completely torn apart. His breathing became shallow when he looked across the Queen sized bed. Ashley was covered in blood, her body lying across her stomach, but her head was facing up. He stared into Ashley's hollow eyes, wondering what she was thinking just before she died. Luis screamed at the sight, running out of the room.

Unable to control himself, he began to vomit in the hallway. It flowed roughly through his throat and seemed to increase in mass every time he thought about Ashley's body. Weak, he crawled on all fours towards his parent's room. He wasn't sure if he could handle, wondering about what he would see in there. His forehead was burning and he began to cough uncontrollably.

Before he could open the door to his parent's room, a sharp pain was going through the left side of his body. Luis screamed, collapsing to the floor. Everything was becoming blurring, and yet, it was all coming back into focus.

Luis opened his eyes, once again aware of the pain that was on his left side. There was no longer a knife implanted in the left side of his body; it felt as if it had been forced out. The cool air roughly kissed the wound, causing it to burn relentlessly. Karin was no longer on top of him, controlling his mind. He did his best to get on his feet as he saw that Luna had tackled Karin off of him. Luna was swiping at her head, but Maka quickly knocked Luna off of Karin.

"Did you get it," Maka asked, holding onto Karin as they began to ascend into the sky.

"Yep," Karin answered with a smug smile on her face. "Let's go; I can figure out the way."

Phil ceased his fighting with Drake and began to climb on the car. Desperately, he jumped to take a bite at Karin. He was too slow, with Maka making dramatic turns in the air. The two of them flew away into the night. The fight continued on, but the vampire's strategy changed. They no longer seemed to wish to fight, but instead to just hold off the werewolves. Finally, Drake jumped onto the top of the abandoned car.

"Let us retreat," Drake called out to his followers. "We have what we need. We will concur them another day!"

At once, the vampires that were left stopped fighting and ran away from the area. The werewolves followed, leaving Luis in the rear. Luis limped as fast as he could, but he knew that he would be no help at all anymore. Alexis had ahold of her severed arm, making sure that it wouldn't be left behind and be turned into ash when the sun rose. She would be able to regenerate the arm back onto her body once they were all safe. Luna was the one leading the pack, wanting to take a bite out of Alexis. Her growling and barking became more prominent, wishing to bite off the girl's head.

The vampires were able to retreat themselves into the hideout. Their hopes in leaving the werewolves in their dust were shattered. They were all ready to fight again, but this time on their own turf. Closed spaces were where vampires always had the upper hand. Light's laughter became that as a mad man, a way to taunt the werewolves. He clenched his body, ready to attack the wolf that was leading the pack. Luna increased her speed, ready to break through the entrance.

Luna was stopped dead in her tracks. She was right at the entry way of the vampire's hideout. The doors were wide open and she could clearly see every one of them standing right in front of her, ready to continue their battle. Phil and Chelsea quickly caught up with Luna but were faced with the same problem. No matter how much they tried, they weren't able to make it through the entry way. By the time Luis was able to catch up to the group, they had stopped trying to force their way in all together.

The ones who were shocked by this the most were the vampires. They knew that they had broken the contract a long time ago, meaning that they were no longer protected under the ancient magic. It should have been perfectly fine for the werewolves to come right in and allow them to continue the battle. None of the vampires dared to venture to the outside; they weren't suicidal. There was a standoff between both the werewolves and the vampires.

Drake couldn't comprehend why the shield was still around them. It didn't seem possible; they had clearly broken the treaty, the werewolves should have been able to come right in and fight to the death. This wasn't a happy or a relieving moment for him. He was disappointed; all of his plans were breaking down right in front of him. He was going to trap them and exterminate them with ease. Of course, Maka and Karin were gone, to make sure that Plan B was taken care of. This wasn't over yet, not by a long shot.

The werewolves decided to retreat, knowing that the vampires weren't going to leave their hideout for any reason. Luna did her best to support Luis up as he limped through the streets. She couldn't help but feel responsible for what happened to him. He was only trying to save her, and he was the one who took the most damage in that fight.

"What did Karin do to you," Phil asked Luis as they began a light job back to Luis's place.

"She wanted me to look in her eyes," Luis began to explain, doing his best to support himself. "I couldn't help it; the pain was too much for me to take. Then, she sent me back to my house. I don't know why I couldn't tell it was a dream from that point. It all seemed just too real. I walked through my house and went to my sister's room. I saw lying on her bed, completely lifeless. I was going to go to my parent's room before Luna snapped me out of it."

Phil's' jaw clenched as Luis finished explaining the ordeal. Luna sympathized with Luis, knowing full well the power that Karin had over someone's mind. She remembered how real it was to be faced with _that Luis_ , and how afraid she was when he wanted to kill her. She knew that your common sense wasn't something that followed you into the daze. That didn't mean they were weak, it only meant that Karin knew how to manipulate illusions, and she was getting better and better with every passing day. There was no way that they were going to make any progressed as long as she still existed in this world.

Maka had carried Karin the entire way. This all had been a part of their plan all along, the Plan B that they needed in order to make sure that they held the werewolves in their place. They both were surprised by how simple it was to do, how easy it was to manipulate the mind of their enemy. Maka was following Karin's directions as closely as possible.

"How do you know where to go," Maka asked as they glided through the night sky.

"He told me," Karin explained, "and he doesn't even know he did it. I told him to take me where his family was, and what would terrify him the most inside that house. As soon as the illusion beamed between us, it was like his mind traveled back to his home. Manipulating the mind of a weakling like him doesn't take much effort."

"Clever," Maka told Karin.

As they approached the house that Karin saw in Luis's dream, she instructed Maka to descend. They landed on top of the roof, already knowing what they needed to do. They were going to find the best way to hurt the werewolf. The two girls prepared themselves for anything to happen; they expected the people to be awake as well, unknowing of the fate that would happen to them.

Karin found the window that resembled the one in the room that Luis woke up in. She smashed it open, ready for an ambush. Seconds passed, and nothing happened. No one came running inside the house, asking them what business they had. There was no security alarm to protect them. The two girls made their way to the hallway. Maka walked straight to the end, passed the stairs and to the master bedroom. There, she found Luis's parents, sleeping peacefully.

"What is this," Maka said to herself. "Karin, are you sure you got the right house?"

"I'm positive," Karin answered, frustrated. "Here, come look! This is the same girl that he saw."

Maka made her way back towards the room closest to the stairway. Karin had recognized the room almost perfectly. Slowly walking in, Karin knew that she was in the right house. His sister was sleeping peacefully in her bed without a care in the world. There was no visible stress on her face, looking as if she had the perfect life, having to go on without any worries.

"They're humans," Maka muttered. "They all carry the scent of the human, but they're connecting to that boy."

"Curious," Karin added, "very curious. We'll have to tell Drake about this when we get back. But first, let's finish the job."

Maka went back to the master bedroom and hovered over the sleeping couple. She didn't want any of them to make any noise and causing attention to be drawn to them. She knew that the quickest way of killing them was to simply stop their breathing. She started with the man, holding his neck between her hands. In a single, swift movement, Maka crushed his windpipe. The man made a coughing noise and then breathe no more. Maka moved on to do the same thing to the female. Maka became apprehensive with the woman, but was swiftly able to end her life. The couple died in their sleep, only clinging to each other's hands.

Karin was always the risk taker, which was why she wanted to handle the fire. She laid out all the flammable substances she could find across the house. Karin wanted to make sure that this place would burn to the ground, leaving behind nothing but ash. Once everything was perfectly laid out, she lit a napkin using the stove. Carefully, she threw the burning napkin onto the floor, lighting the ground on fire. Karin had made the trail to go the opposite way of the stairs, to give her enough time to get away.

The two girls met at the top of the stairs, right next to Ashley's room, to implement the final part of their plan. They were grateful that the girl appeared to be a heavy sleeper. They knew that there wasn't much time left for them to escape. Karin had underestimated the power of the flames, which were about to start burning up the stairs. They ripped whatever clothing they could from the girl's room and tied up her arms and legs. They covered her mouth; the force causing her to wake up. She wanted to scream, but it was dully muffled by the shirt that was covering her lips. Ashley's eyes were screaming as her muffled voice was begging for them to leave her alone. That was when she noticed the flames, which were rising much quicker than Karin expected. Ashley was now crying, her muffled screams becoming louder.

Maka moved over to the girl's window, breaking open the glass.

"Let's go," Maka instructed Karin, who was keeping a good hold of Ashley.

grabbed onto Karin and picked the two of them up. Ashley couldn't believe that she was flying through the air by a girl who seemed to be much smaller than her. She looked down, terrified by how far off the ground they were. She quickly fainted, bringing relief to the vampires who had to carry her. Their job was finished, and it was done very well. They began to wonder how important their Plan B would be; neither of them had any knowledge of what happened after they left. As they were instructed, Maka flew Karin and their hostage back to the hideout, prepared for further orders.

Chapter Sixteen: Actions

Too slow to save them,

They must face the aftermath.

Prepare for next time.

Luis's limp didn't seem to get any better as they made their way back to his house. Luna and Phil knew that a werewolf's body was resilient and could talk almost anything. The blood had appeared to stop flowing out of the wound, but he wasn't healing up as quickly they expected he would. The knife must have dug in much deeper than they had anticipated. Through it all, Luis still insisted that he was fine, that he was proud of his scar.

As they got closer to the house, they noticed a bright orange glow slowly rising in the distance. It was too early for it to be the sun; Phil worried about the worst. With Luna and Chelsea by Luis's side, he ran up ahead to see what the damage was. The trio walked, side by side, awaiting their leader's return.

"I still think you're an idiot coming back for me," Luna nagged. "I almost had him off of me by myself; I didn't need you to help me. It's my fault that you're like this."

"Quit it, Luna," Luis told her, doing his best to increase his speed, ignoring the burning pain. "You weren't fine; that guy had you pinned to the ground. I couldn't just let you get hurt. I'm proud of my scar. If I'm an idiot for saving someone I care deeply for, then I'll proudly take that title."

"They do say only idiots fall in love," Chelsea added, trying to add humor to the situation. She then thought back to the ending of their battle. "What I don't understand is why we couldn't attack them at their hideout. I mean, we had them right there, they were ours. It doesn't make any sense."

"Maybe it was for the best," Luis commented. They were getting closer and closer to the house, the light becoming brighter and brighter. "Think about it, we all weren't in the best of conditions when we reached their hideout. Those vampires could have probably easily overtaken us. At least now, we bought ourselves some time to come up with a plan."

"We need to figure out why we can't go into their hideout." Luna insisted. "As long as that shield of there is up, they'll always be able to retreat back there whenever things become too dicey for them. Once we get rid of that line of defense, then we can start worrying about taking them out."

"It's obvious that the treaty is still in effect," Chelsea told them. Both Luis and Luna looked and Chelsea, completely dumbfounded. "Think about it for a second, as long as the treaty is in effect, you can't kill them or enter their base. You may have seriously injured them as they did us, but they do have the ability to fix up their bodies. I don't know how they're doing it, but that contract is still in effect, meaning that we cannot kill each other until it is broken."

They had reached the corner where they would enter the street where Luis's house was. The light was brighter than ever. Before they turned, Phil had cut them off. His eyes were like glass, focusing mostly on Luis.

"Turn back," Phil instructed them. "There's nothing for us to see here. We need to go to Chelsea's house. You're going to have to go buy Luis and me some clothes as soon as you guys change back into your human forms. I don't want any questions, just do as I say. Now!"

"What the hell are you talking about," Luis said, breaking past Phil.

Luis turned the street, only to be greeted by the grimmest sight he could ever imagine. Right in the lot where his house was supposed to be was a giant, unforgiving flame. A number of people were standing outside the house, screaming for help. There was nothing anyone to do to douse the flames. The structure collapsed on itself, the foundation becoming far too weak to support itself anymore. There was a loud crash, a couple of screams, the sound of an explosion from the property. The fire had grown much taller, a bright mushroom cloud rising from the flames.

Luna appeared by Luis's side, her eyes latched onto the flames. She did her best to avert Luis's eyes, to get him away from the sight. She used her head to move his body, avoiding hurting his cut leg as much as people. Chelsea joined in, doing her best to ignore the flaming building. Luis's heart had sunk. Ignoring the pain, he ran away from the house. There was no way this could have been just a mere coincidence. He felt stupid for allowing that vampire into his mind. It didn't matter to him how long it took, he was going to break the shield and kill every single one of those vampires.

"Get back here," Phil ordered.

"Just leave me alone!" Luis told them, running as fast as he could.

"Luis, please stop," Luna asked him as she tried to catch up. She was amazed by how quick he was going with his deep wound. "You have to listen to me. You can't change anything; they're going to kill you if you go anywhere near there without a plan."

"Then I'll take as many of them as I can with me," Luis growled at her. "Stay away Luna. I'm not letting anyone stop me."

Luis had increased his speed, unable to ignore the pain that was burning from his left side. He began to whimper with every single step he took. Luna knew that if he didn't stop, it would cause serious damage to his entire body. Desperate to stop him, she increased her speed and jumped. Luna tackled Luis to the ground, the two of them beginning to roll down a ditch. Luna made sure that she had Luis pinned down to the floor, making sure that he wouldn't try any way to escape.

"Let me go Luna," Luis barked; his tone much harsher than he had ever spoken to her with before. "What if it was your house that burnt down with those you cared about inside? Would you let me stop you?"

"Just shut up," Luna ordered him, her tears falling onto his fur. "You have every right to be upset. I'd probably act the same way if I was in the same position, but I know that you'd do anything to stop me from doing anything stupid. Your family didn't deserve what happened to them, and the vampires will pay for it. Don't let their death be in vain by you doing something stupid. I know it's not much, but, you still have me. I'm not going to abandon you Luis. You can't allow them to get to you. I love you."

Luis's rapid breathing began to slow in tempo, his rage slowly becoming calmer. He knew that Luna was right; he would go after her and try to stop her from doing anything that would risk her life. Since day one, Luna had been his best friend; someone that he could always find comfort in. Chelsea and Phil followed them down into the ditch, checking to see if Luis had gone through any more damage. Miraculously, he didn't seem to have damaged his wound any further than it already was. They all helped Luis out of the ditch, and they all ran away from the glow, to a much safer place.

Drake didn't seem to wrap his mind around the entire mess. Everything had gone according to his plan, just like he imagined it. He wanted to lead the werewolves to their complex, making it easier for him to finish them off. Once they were all gone, then he would be able to take the entire town hostage. As long as the pack lived, he still wasn't free. As the sun began to rise over the mountains, he tried to figure out why the treaty was still protecting them. Quietly, Alexis made her way into his chambers, her body shaking. Everyone knew not to mess with Drake when he was in one of his moods. He turned to her, his face unsympathetic towards her.

"What is it that you need," Drake asked Alexis with a voice that could cut through glass.

"The girl, she's awake," Alexis informed him, her voice very shallow. "Drake, what are we going to do with her."

"That is of no concern of yours!" Drake sneered at Alexis. "I will do with her what I please."

He quickly made his way passed Alexis and out of the room. Alexis remained standing in Drake's room, clutching deeply to her chest. She couldn't understand what was wrong with her body. For a long time now, she was in love with Drake; she believed that he did have her best interests at heart. She thought that all of these new members were Drake's way of granting one of her life long dreams, having a family. Alexis didn't want to bring herself to face the reality that was her current situation. She didn't want to see the man she loved as a power hungry tyrant who only cared for himself.

_But he kissed me, he pleases me_ , Alexis thought to herself foolishly. _That has to mean he loves me, right? He's just frustrated, not sure about what he wants to do next. He was going to free our family tonight, but his plans were postponed. Drake does love me. He wasn't able to save me from getting my arm ripped off because he was busy dealing with the wolves, not because he didn't care. He does love me. Mistakes happen, and we need to know how to forgive others for the mistakes they make, no matter how severe they are. Drake, he does love me._

Drake made his way down the building to the sixth floor. He expected Maka and Karin to obey his orders in bringing the prisoner to this floor and make sure that she is securely locked their hostage up. They had taken out a group of police officers only a few nights prior, so they had the proper kind of restraints in case they needed some. As he left the elevator, he was being followed by Light, who seemed very curious with Drake's plans. He knew better than to ask ridiculous questions when Drake was in such a foul mood. Standing outside the door was Karin, who was keeping the girl within a trance.

"Release her," Drake ordered Karin. "We need this girl to keep her sanity. She's useless if she doesn't even know what's real or fake anymore."

At once, Karin broke the spell that she had on the girl inside. Her eyes appeared to be in a daze, her throat severely inflamed. Ashley and Drake met eye to eye, her right arm handcuffed to a water pipe; she didn't seem to be struggling at all to get away. This oddly intrigued Drake's mind much more than the treaty for the time being.

"Do you know where you are," Drake ordered out of the girl.

"No," Ashley answered weakly.

"Where were you before you ended up in this place?" Drake forced the question onto her, as if her very life depended on her answer.

"I had gone to sleep in my room," She answered after a brief pause. "When I woke up, this place was padded, but when you entered, all the padding when away. It was like magic."

"What is your name?" Drake asked. He knew that she was going to fall unconscious again very soon, but he needed to know as much from her as possible.

"Jessica," Ashley lied. She may not have been in the proper state of mind, but she didn't want to reveal to them her true name. Ashley told the strangers the first name that popped into her mind.

There was nothing more that he wanted to ask the girl for the time being. He left her in the room as she began to cry herself to sleep. If he was going to keep her here, then he was going to have to learn how to satisfy her human needs. There was no way that he was able to leave the hideout now, but he was going to have to get the young woman food, water, and whatever else they required to keep her alive.

He closed the door behind him, and locked it, making sure that no one else was able to get into the room, no matter what. Everyone followed him as they ascended back to the thirteenth floor. No one was willing to speak to anyone, fearing an early death. None of this was supposed to take place; if everything had gone according to plan, the young hostage would have become a snack for them.

Light seemed lost in trying to track Drake's thoughts; it was another moment where he feared that Drake was going way off track. To him, there was no need to keep the human girl as a prisoner, even if she was the sibling of a werewolf. It was obvious that the girl was human; if she was anything else, she wouldn't have been able to cross the barrier that was keeping them safe in the first place.

"Why don't we just turn her into a vampire," Light asked as everyone paced around the thirteenth floor, trying to make sense of everything. "What do you think is going to hurt that kid more, knowing that his entire family is dead, or knowing that his very own flesh and blood is now his enemy?"

"You talk too much," Drake muttered to Light. "Maybe if you learned to shut your damn trap for a few minutes, then you'd be able to think and figure out why I haven't changed that stupid girl yet! Tell us Light, do you have any other plans that we could use? I'm sure we'd all love to hear you input and lead us straight to the Gates of Hell!"

No one moved. If Drake wanted to take down Light, then there was no way they were going to stop him. If anyone tried to stop him, they'd only end up dead as well. Light looked for help from his sister, who wouldn't even look him in the eye anymore. He had completely severed ties with her. His knees buckled, waiting for Drake to come in and finish his life. Seconds passed, and anticipation built.

"Don't misunderstand what is going on here," Drake informed Light, also directing his anger at the rest of them. "The only reason that he is still alive right now is because we need him in order to take down the wolves. From this day on, you are merely a tool, used to craft our escape from this situation. If you ever think about crossing me, or questioning my authority, even for a second, I promise that I will end your life quickly. Do I make myself perfectly clear?"

Light nodded. Norma had rushed to his side to comfort him. She held onto his side, but he couldn't figure out why. Light couldn't understand why this girl was hugging him in such a way, after what he had just gone through. Maybe she was simply happy that they made it through the night and wasn't killed by the werewolves. He raised his arms around her, simply to mimic the actions that Norma did. There was no emotion in his actions; this was the opposite of how he wished to feel. Norma released him, now simply clutching onto his hand. She held on tightly as they awaited their new orders from Drake.

"You may be asking yourselves, 'What is our next step'," Drake began, giving himself time to think. "It is obvious that we are protected by this shield, but that also means that we cannot destroy the menace that wishes to destroy our lifestyle. Somewhere in that ancient treaty that Alexander forged so long ago is some sort of loop-hold. Magical treaties are the strongest bond in the world; it consciously knows when it has been broken and punishes the party that severed it apart. For all intents and purposes, we have not broken this ancient deal. To this, I say, that we continue with our ways and do as we have done; feed on the blood of the humans, all of whom who are guilty of simply living, and convert those who are worthy of a second chance.

"As for the girl, we need her alive," Drake continued, pacing around the room. "As long as she is alive, the wolves will stop at nothing to get inside. That will work for our advantage. They will find whatever means possible to break the contract themselves, doing our job for us. And once they have found a way to break the treaty; that is when we strike. They will act like fools and come in after us, only to be trapped by their own blind justice. Then, once they have been extinguished, we will test if the girl is worth enough to join our ranks."

Everyone lightly cheered around him, not bombastically, but enough to feed his ego. He knew how to speak to others, to get others on his side. Drake was a master of fallacies and manipulation. Everyone was blindly being led by him, not knowing the truth of what happened when Alexander disappeared. Even if he decided to tell them what truly happened that night, he knew that they would still follow him wherever he told them to go. They were all his tools, crafted to be used until something better or stronger came along. As soon as that time would come, he would get rid of the old, as he did with Alexander.

The Sunday morning sun was covered behind the grey storm clouds. Inside of Chelsea's apartment building, she had returned with a fresh purchase of men's clothes. She walked into the room, where Luna was quietly watching television right next to two giant wolves. If anyone else had walked into the room, they would have figured they were imagining things or have just gone completely mad. Phil was the first to enter the bathroom to transform. Luis had been curled up into a ball in the corner of the room, hiding in the shadows. Chelsea knelt down next to him and petted his head. She could only imagine the kind of pain he was going through. As soon as Phil exited the bathroom, Luis trotted over to get changed.

The process of transforming was painful for Luis. As a human, the cut manifested itself entirely on his left shoulder. If it had gone any deeper or was implemented a little bit lower, he would have most likely been much more severe. Luis groaned and ached as he tried to get his clothes on. Tears fell from his eyes, trying his best to place on his shirt. As Luis left the bathroom, he was met with Luna, who did her best to smile.

"Chelsea told me to help you with this," Luna informed him.

In her hand was a small sling for his arm. He realized that he had probably caused serious damage to the inside of his arm by doing all that running. He simply nodded, taking a seat on the bed. As Luna tried her best to get the sling around him, he stared at an empty spot at the ceiling. He never thought that the death of his family would have done something like this to him. They always fought and hardly ever saw eye to eye. He couldn't wait to get out of the house and have his own life. But now, he was depressed. There was no one left around to bug him, whether it be someone to bring him down when he was feeling proud, or to make his life much rougher than it needed to be.

"Y'know," Luna began in a soft voice, "when I was a little girl, I always wanted to be a nurse. I'm pretty good at this sling stuff."

"A nurse?" Luis lightly chuckled. "How would you do that with balancing being part-wolf; it seems almost impractical."

"Yeah, I know that now," Luna told him, making sure his arm was tilted at a decent angle. "When I was a kid though, I didn't think about that stuff. All I wanted to do was help people when they were feeling sick and help them get better. It's the doctors who get all the credit for making their patients better, even though it's the nurses who do all the work."

"She's right," Phil commented. "I remember when we were kids and I got sick with the flu and she kept bringing me glasses or orange juice. The only thing is she never stopped bringing them, so a lot of the juice went warm. And she wouldn't leave my room until she saw me finish every single glass. In the end, she got sick as well, but she always checked to make sure that I was okay."

Everyone in the room began to laugh. They were all facing the television which was on a news show, talking about the fire at Luis's house. They listened and heard that there have only been two bodies found throughout the rubble, the bodies of two full grown adults. Luis began to smile, beginning to hope that Ashley had snuck out in the middle of the night. Nothing else seemed to be found at the site that shows how the fire started.

"We got a friend down at the police station who's a witch," Phil told Luis. "We'll tell him that you were with us the entire night, and he'll come up with an alibi for you that he can sell to the rest of the force. We're not going to have them suspect you for arson just so you can collect the insurance."

"Thanks," Luis said weakly. It wasn't the best news, but at least it wasn't bad news.

"They probably got your sister though," Phil continued. "I don't know what they'll do with her though, hold her hostage, kill her, or maybe turn her into one of them. Anything's plausible. What we need to do is find out why the treaty isn't breaking and figure out a way to break it ourselves. Where going to help your sister Luis, that's a promise."

"So, what are we going to do now," Chelsea asked.

"We're going to leave this place once our semesters end," Phil said. He knew that everyone in the room trusted him. Everyone in the room was thinking the same thing he was: they needed to look for someone who knew about treaties and how to break them. Luna and Phil couldn't return home, and they knew Rick was never going back. They hoped that on their journey, they'd find Rick and have them join their team.

"We're going to start in Los Angeles," Phil continued. "I've heard somewhere that there's a powerful witch there who could probably help us. If anything, it's a start to get us going in the right direction. We can't just sit on our laurels as the vampire's take over the town. We'll only be gone for a little while, but it's for the best if we want to save everyone else."

Silently, everyone was in agreement. They were going to find a way to bring an end to their enemies, and looking around was the best way to start. They were hoping to find allies who would join them in their cause, or at least aid them in any way possible. They needed to raise their numbers, for they knew that the vampires were raising theirs. Some would say that it would be impossible for them to take out the vampires, to just surrender with their tails between their legs and not interfere. But they knew that fighting was the right thing to do.

Luis shifted his gaze over to Luna, who smiled at him. She planted a small kiss upon his lips. They tightly held hands as they planned on their new life together. They were in love with each other, and they loved Phil and Chelsea as well. It was a small, but it was a family, a real family. She wrapped himself around Luis and Phil started to plan their movements.

THE END OF BOOOK ONE

###

Afterword and Acknowledgements

This is kind of a remake of the first novel I had ever finished writing. I've always been interested in werewolves and magic, so writing about such things is always a joy in my eyes. The stories are very similar, but they are also completely different. I wrote it as a junior in high school, and at the time of finishing this story, I am a sophomore in college. I'd like to believe that my writing has improved over the years. Luis and Luna are both names that I love (especially Luna, mainly due to the _Harry Potter_ novels). I told myself that they would be the names of my first boy and girl, whenever that time will be. So, for my first published novel, it seemed appropriate.

This novel was written during NaNoWriMo 2011, and took a couple of months to edit and become ready to make public. Looking through it, it was hard to fight the urge to listen to the voice that said "This is all crap! You're a terrible writer! Stop! Stop now!". There are many things that I wish I could change, but it would only take away from the story.

My favorite place to write my stories is inside my room. It's nice a quiet, and I have all the time in the world to think. Sometimes, I will go outside and look out at the world, finding my next source of inspiration. Of course, listening to music during writing this was a big help. If only I could find a pair of headphones that don't decide to die out on me after a month.

First off, I'd like to dedicate this book to the authors of fiction that have motivate me to write my own stories. In regular novels, as well as manga, I enjoy explore the worlds that you have crafted for my enjoyment.

Next, I thank the creators of my favorite musicals: _RENT,_ _Sweeney Todd,_ and _Chicago_ ; as well as the composers to the original soundtracks to _The Social Network_ and _Summer Wars_. Also, the amazing bands that write the songs that are on my playlist: The Fray, Skillet, Linkin Park, Fade, and Puffy. Every single beat and lyric is an added source of inspiration and I will keep listening to your wonderful music.

To the members of KH-Vids.net Forum, I must give a shout out. For many years now, I have been a part of this big community. Thank you for welcoming me in since the very beginning.

To my family, thank you for always being there for me. You've had to sacrifice because of me, but we all know that it's been worth it. Thank you for supporting me in my dreams and endeavors.

To the teachers who helped change my views on reading and learning: Ms. Harden (librarian), Mr. Haden (New Mexico History), and Mr. Greenberg (Philosophy). I thank you for opening me up to the wonders of learning that others seem to blind themselves to.

Finally, I owe a very special thank you to the one that this book is dedicated to, Chelsea. You're a continuing source of inspiration to me and is always there for me whenever I need you to be. I love you. There, now my feelings for you will be written into history.

About the Author

Jose Luis Solórzano is a lover of all things fantasy and adventure. Ever since his first exposure to it in high school, he has been a fan of anime and manga, his favorite series including _  
Death Note_ , _Romeo x Juliet_ , and _The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya._ His other love is watching movies, with a love for every genre. Ever since his birth, he has been living with a severe heart disease known as Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy.

Jose Luis currently resides in Southern California with his family, awaiting a heart transplant. He is a staff writer for _Harbor Tides_ , the school newspaper of _Los Angeles Harbor College_. Jose also does armature voice acting on the Voice Acting Alliance Forums.

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Twitter: <http://twitter.com/joseluissolo>

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Podcast: <http://enthusiasmunleashed.podomatic.com/>

My Blog: <http://thisisjosespeaking.blogspot.com/>

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