Chapter 4: Changes

At 12:53 in the morning, Lee Gray woke up gasping for breath. The alley lay around him, quiet if not for the sound of Lee’s panting. His breath caught on something in his throat and he coughed violently, turning over to spit out globs of congealing blood onto the already bloody ground. His hands and clothes were covered in the stuff. *What happened? My…*

The echo of pain shot to his neck as he remembered what had happened. Lee lurched back, grabbing for the side of his throat that had been bitten and found…nothing. He wiped at it a few times, feeling the smooth surface of his skin, completely free of any blemish or imperfection.

Lee almost began to think the whole thing had been some messed-up dream. Perhaps someone had spiked his drink and he only now had seen the effects.

Then he saw the body.

In the darkness of the alley, he had almost missed the headless lump near the wall. A scream rose in his throat but was stopped by the urge to throw up. He bent over, spraying bloody vomit on the ground. *Jesus Christ! That man…how did he do that? Why am I even…*

“You’re awake,” Lee whirled around, turning to face the entrance but slipping on some of the still-wet blood and falling back. A girl stood a few feet away, watching Lee with interest. She wore a dark blue jacket, its hood covering her hair. “Whoever that guy was…he really did it,” she mumbled to herself, stepping further into the alley. She pulled down her hood slowly and Lee finally recognised her.

“Jill?” he managed. Jill Goode turned to the body, squatting down and looking at it inquisitively.

“I only saw some of what happened,” she explained. “Mostly just that guy doing…this.”

“What is happening?” Lee said, standing up slowly. His clothes were covered in dried blood, but their dark colour helped to hide it somewhat. The same couldn’t be said for splashes on his face. “I don’t…I was—”

“Dead,” she finished, standing straight once more. “You were dead, Gray. Bled out.” Lee’s hands were in his hair. His memory was a mess, a jumble of images and blood and it took all of his effort to piece it all together. *I can’t be dead. I’m here, aren’t I?*

“But,” he said, his voice strained. “he…that man, he killed him! Then he…” he remembered Henka’s head rolling from his shoulders, the way the rest of his body crumpled to the floor, the man kneeling over him…

“Oh come on, Gray!” Jill rolled her eyes, exasperated. He had knelt over him and cut himself. A vampire’s nails were strong enough to cut through steel, but the man had used them to draw his own blood. Jill stepped closer. “Think about it.”

“I…he…he dripped blood into my mouth,” he said. Jill’s eyes watched him. “I…I died.”

*“I’m sorry Lee. I hoped I wouldn’t have to do this.”*

*No. No, this isn’t right.*

*“You were dead, Gray. Bled out.”*

*I’m not—*

He remembered his high school biology class. They had spent a whole term on the differences between humans and vampires. Months of studying and revision came back to him, textbooks and lessons and presentations echoing back in his ears.

*“The only way to spread the vampire disease to humans—”*

“Have you finally figured it out?” Jill asked.

*“—is through the consumption or transplantation of infected blood.”*

Lee looked up and watched as Jill’s mouth cracked open into a smile, her top two canine teeth growing long. “Welcome to the club, asshole,” she said.

\*

“What the actual fuck?” Boris said as they stood before the scene. Behind them, a short Asian woman with a thick wool coat spoke with someone on the phone. Moments before, her screams had alerted them both and brought them over.

A man was dead in the middle of the alley, his head a few feet away from his neck. Blood had gathered in a pool in the middle and had begun to darken and congeal. Harriet swallowed the urge to vomit and stepped in, pulling her pistol from its holder. She didn’t expect to find anything—if there *was* someone else further in the alley, wouldn’t they have killed the woman as she screamed? Still, she knew she wouldn’t feel safe if she didn’t check. She reached a dead end, finding only a pile of trash and a dead rat. *We missed it. We fucking missed it, and now someone else is dead.*

“They say they’re going to be five minutes,” the woman said, still on the phone.

“Thank you,” Boris told her. “It’s okay, you can go back inside, now.” She nodded, walking back into the building to Harriet’s left and averting her eyes from the body. When she was gone, Boris looked at Harriet. “How the hell could we miss this, it was only a street away.”

“I don’t know.” Harriet knelt down, kneeling over the victim’s head but taking care not to disturb anything. He was maybe in his late twenties with long blonde hair and a nose that looked like it had been broken multiple times. His whole face was smeared with blood and his eyes were still open.

“I mean…this can’t be the same guy, though, right?” Boris said, staying as far from the body as he could. He waved ambiguously at the whole area. “This isn’t exactly the same as what happened with Jenkins.” Harriet shook her head and moved over to the body. He had come to rest almost in the foetal position. The cut at the neck looked rough, but straight and clean nonetheless. It was as if the killer had used a dull blade and sliced the head off with one. *Consistent with other decapitations by vampires. But why bother?* Harriet didn’t even realise she was taking notes.

She took a step back. “Holy shit.”

“What?” Boris asked, seeing the look on her face. She opened her mouth to speak but managed to stop herself. *He needs to learn.*

“You tell me,” she said eventually.

Boris cocked his head. “I’m sorry?”

“What is wrong with this picture?” she took a few more steps back, gesturing at the body. “What did I just see? Tell me.” Boris looked back at the body but didn’t move.

“I don’t know—”

“Come on, Anderson,” Harriet said. “Think.” Though he still didn’t look like he wanted to, Boris took a few steps forward, carefully avoiding the blood and the vomit on the ground. He leaned over the body, examining the places he had seen her looking.

“I…can’t tell,” he said. “Head’s been taken off, looks like it was done in one cut. He was a big guy, probably about thirty, blood all over his neck, shirt, and hands. Makes sense, I didn’t think decapitations would be all that clean, anyway.” He turned a little, getting a view of the head. “What I don’t get is why you’d do this. Beheading someone’s gonna take a whole lot more energy than just letting them bleed out. Plus, it’s probably a huge waste of blood, if you’re surviving meal-to-meal.” *He’s almost there.*

“There are no signs of a struggle, either,” he continued. “If he’d been fighting back, he’d have shit under his nails, but…And he’s not exactly an easy looking target for a vampire to…” something appeared to strike him and Harriet raised her eyebrows. He turned towards her. “Is…is this guy even human?”

She couldn’t help but smile a little. “Only one way to find out.” Even regular police officers were provided with their own ultra-violet torch. While the sun didn’t emit enough UV waves to harm a vampire, their torches produced enough to make them burn like fire. Harriet chose a spot, the man’s left index finger, and switched it on.

As soon as the bright purple light shone onto it, the skin began to crackle and burn. She turned it off immediately, but the smell of cooking flesh persisted.

“Holy shit,” Boris said. Harriet nodded, replacing the torch on her belt. *This is more serious than just a feeding. If vampires are killing each other in the streets, it could mean another gang war.* She almost shuddered at the thought. The last big war, which was between the Pariahs and the Nightbrothers about twenty years ago, had left a sizeable chunk of Lambeth completely under vampire control.

*If this is gang-related, we need to control it immediately.* There was always the possibility that this was just two rogue vampires fighting it out over a kill, but something about what had happened felt off. Beheadings weren’t common, nor were they done with so much apparent ease.

“Alright,” she said eventually. “Wait here until backup arrives. I’m going to the station.”

“You’re leaving me?” Boris asked as she moved to the entrance of the alley.

“Tell them only what they should know,” she said. “Don’t say anything about him being a vampire.  I don’t want this getting out just yet.”

He sighed, apparently too tired to argue. “And what’re you going to do?”

“Me? I’m going to get started on the shit ton of paperwork we’re gonna need to do.”

\*

Lee ran. He didn’t really know why, but if he didn’t he felt as if he’d explode. He left Jill, still standing in the alley. He left Henka’s body. He barely even looked where he was running.

*That’s not true. It’s not. It can’t be.*

Lee ran and didn’t stop until he reached his flat. Even then, he ran up the stairs, all the way up to the tenth floor. He ran down the hall and only stopped when he reached the door.

He wasn’t even out of breath.

*I never saw him feed me. Maybe he just stitched it up, or something. Maybe if you put vampire blood on the wound, it’ll just heal you.* It didn’t feel right. Nothing felt right. He felt like he was wearing the wrong skin, like nothing was in the right place. His arms weren’t his own, his sight wasn’t the same.

Eventually, he found his keys and crept inside. The lights were off, but the signs outside bathed the room in a purple glow. As quiet as possible, he closed the door behind him and took off his shoes. As he put them away, he saw the blood still caked on his hands. *My blood, or his?*

Swallowing down his re-emerging panic, he went to the bathroom. It was small, with a tiny square shower right next to a toilet, which was right next to the sink. Lee locked the door behind him and turned on the tap. The cold water lifted some of the blood that was still a little wet, but the dry parts had to be rubbed away. The sink filled with red as he worked it off, trying his best to keep it away from the rest of the bathroom.

He had to wash his face too. Streaks of dried blood ran all the way from the top of his hair to the bottom of his neck. He had laid in the stuff when he was…

He washed it all, splashing ice-cold water onto his face and neck. He rubbed the side of his neck that should have been a gaping bite wound. he ran the water through his hair, ringing it out with his hands, which shook from the cold.

He didn’t know when he started crying, but it didn’t help the way he looked when he saw himself in the mirror. In the washing basket, he pulled on a new shirt. It wasn’t clean, but it was better than the one he was wearing.

He was back in the living room, throwing out the shirt when he smelled it. Blood. After his previous encounter, Lee half-expected himself to be repulsed by it. But what he smelled was…different. It still had that iron tang, that almost sweet, almost sour smell from before, but when Lee caught wind of it, his mouth began to salivate. He froze in place, captivated by the smell, curious as to why *now* it smelled…intoxicating.

That was when he realised that Polly was in the flat. Probably in bed, by now. She had work again in the morning, so she was always in bed by now.

Asleep. Alone. Smelling so…

Lee caught himself staring at her door. The smell was intense, but so were many things. The residual body odour on his shirt, the cup of tea that had been left out with a third of it left, the cat on the third floor, the first few drops of rain outside.

Polly’s heart was beating slowly, methodically. She was asleep, and her heart was pumping all that blood around.

Lee’s hand went to his mouth. *What is happening to me?* *Oh God, what do I do?*

“Come to the window, Lee.” He heard the voice from outside. It barely talked over a whisper, but he heard it as clear as day. It sounded…familiar. Slowly, he walked over to the nearest window. The rain was picking up now, hitting the glass with arrhythmic taps.

Down below, Lee could see two figures below. They looked up at him, an umbrella covering them both. Despite being on the tenth floor, despite the rain, despite the glass, he could see them perfectly. Jill and Professor Robinson stood at the other side of the street, gazing up and right into Lee’s eyes.

“We should talk, Mr Gray,” Isiah said. “Please, come down.”