The Cost

Note from the author:

First, I want to thank all of the people who have sent such kind e-mails to me telling me how much they are enjoying my work so far. Since this is the first time I've tried my hand at writing, except for papers when I was in school and they don't count, its very reassuring to know that people actually do like it. Thanks again for all the support!

Second, I would like to thank Mary and Angel again. Their advice and help have been most illuminating

Lastly, I just wanted to make clear that some of the views expressed in this work do not necessarily mirror my own. You'll see why I had to make that distinction after you read this chapter, lol. Please, no e-mails with threats of burning in hell:)

That said, enjoy this chapter and I promise, I'll have the next one out in two shakes of a lamb's tail. Sorry this one took so long, but I'm starting to pick up some momentum. Thanks again, and enjoy!

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It is almost five in the morning when I pull up to the Sheraton hotel. The valet is still off duty, so I park my car in front of the large doors before I run inside to procure a room. I have changed from the clothes I was wearing earlier, but I have only changed to another pair of sweat pants and long sleeved shirt. I go through phases where clothes and my appearance are important to me, but I am not in one now.

The bored-looking young man behind the desk barely glances up at me when I approach the counter, probably because I look like some punk kid, but I quickly grab his attention when I pull out my wallet and start waving platinum credit cards and cash around. Money may not make the world go round, but it sure as hell greases the wheels and gets it to spin a bit faster. First impressions have a great deal to do with it too, and I make a mental note to go out and buy new clothing. After doing a quick mental checklist of the things that I have packed in my lone bag, I bump that note up to a priority.

For now, money will suffice. The clerk makes a good show of seeming enthusiastic and peppy as he quickly checks me into, what he assures me is, one of their best rooms.

"I'm sure it will be fine," I say wearily as I slip the card key into my pocket with one hand and pull a couple of twenties from my wallet with the other. I am suddenly tired and have to forcibly suppress a yawn. This is unnatural, for me, anyway. I seldom have actual need of sleep, though I do sleep frequently only because I am bored, and I have not felt tired since, well... I honestly cannot remember the last time I was physically tired.

"Is there anything else I can do for you, Mr. Chamberlain?" he asks, the false chipperness of his deep voice turning to genuine appreciation as I hand him the twenties. Chamberlain is the last name on the new credit cards and ID I am using. I have cut up the old ones, reasoning that if someone is trying to follow a paper trail on me, this should slow them down.

Of course, leaving Birmingham would have been even more helpful. Being a "role model" for the virtues of reason and logic, I am still having trouble believing that I am standing in the lobby of a hotel in the very same city that I was attacked in only hours ago. I doubt the dead bodies have even been removed from my home yet.

After leaving the house, I did go to the airport. My jet was there waiting for me, along with the package containing my new identity and money. Predictably, I sent the jet on its way without me at the last minute and asked one of the airport security guards for directions to a decent hotel. The name I am using now is Grant Chamberlain, and I am twenty-six years old. I should dye my hair to match the ID, but I think I would look silly with blonde hair. And I claim not to be a vain person.

I did say, however, that I am impulsive when I want something. Reason and logic are cast aside and my impulses take over. I want to see where, if anywhere, this thing with Shane goes. I realize it may seem I am thinking with my dick right now, and perhaps I am. Thousands of years of life have not destroyed the basest of desires in me, even if they come very seldom these days, and, in that way, perhaps I am more human than I think. I still believe that, with Shane, it is more than that. It is rare that my attraction to a person goes beyond physical. Really, aside from the comment about his finding his way onto his back, I have not thought of him sexually. Much. More importantly, he is able to make me laugh and I find comfort in his presence.

I also stated that I am a predator at heart and I do not relish the idea of running away from anything. I have always been the hunter, never the hunted. I almost take offense to the idea that it could be otherwise.

That said, I still do not feel badly for the men I have killed. Having killed many over the years and witnessing the deaths of countless more that were not even by my hand, I really believe I am numb to the entire concept of death. It is not as though I will one day die, so why would I identify with a concept that is alien to me? I have been this way for too long now and I don't think I even remember what it was like to fear for my life. I might pity humans, or envy them depending on my mood, but I cannot genuinely sympathize. Not anymore.

I know it may seem that I am a cold and uncaring monster, if I am to be judged by human standards. But I am not human. Those standards do not apply to me and those judgments are therefore meaningless.

I was not always like this though. I was always a hard person out of necessity when I was human. I had to be, due to my position. There is a saying I read in a book once: "On the heights, the paths are paved with daggers." None, save one other, was higher than me, and a soft person would not have survived long traversing the roads I traveled. But I was never this hard. That person seems even more alien to me than death.

Really, I think I died that day.

I am snapped back to reality by the young man behind the counter when he repeats his question, though a bit louder this time, "Sir! Will there be anything else I can assist you with?" He doesn't look or sound as eager to help as he did a few moments ago. That's twice in the space of less than a day that I have just zoned out, and I worry I am getting old when I think of how tired I am feeling.

I am definitely tired. There is no mistaking that feeling, strange though it is. "Actually, there is something, " I pull more than a few bills from the wad of neatly folded cash, passing the twenties for larger, "Could you please park my car for me and carry my bag to my room? The car is right outside the door and the bag is in the passenger seat."

His eyes bulge at the amount in my hand. I believe I have well over a grand there, and he looks at me like I have lost my mind. "I can't accept that much, sir!"

A wave of dizziness comes over me. I grab the edge of the counter as I lay the money down in an effort to steady myself and I feel the heat spark from my eyes, unbidden, as I look at the clerk, strangely furious all of a sudden, "Then donate it to the needy if you must, just park the goddamned car and bring my bag to the room!" It was not my intent to snap at him or to use my eyes to sway his mind like that. I also lost control of my tone towards the end of the sentence, and I worry that I may have damaged him.

It is very delicate work to manipulate a person's mind, requiring a great deal of finesse and control on my part. Some minds are easier to control than others and it usually depends on the strength of will of the person I am trying to affect. I think of it as bending a person's will to my own. It takes a great deal of willpower to live for ten thousand years, even with, or maybe because of, the fact that I can't die, so it is never a question of contest when I match my will against a mortal's. I just have to try harder with strong individuals and the risk of damaging them increases with the effort involved.

I only use mind control sparingly these days, on the rare occasions when I hunt and when I feel it is important. I do not, and never have used complete mind control for sex. That equates to much the same as rape to me. I have gone through lazy periods in the past where I have used the power of my eyes and voice to quickly get what I want, but I would earn a reputation as a witch, or some other nonsense of the like, and end with angry mobs of people brandishing pitchforks while tossing torches at my door. This resulted in several hangings and a few burnings at the stake for me, but only because I allowed it. Sometimes, I just wasn't in the mood to slaughter hundreds of people. Certainly no mob of angry villagers, no matter their numbers, could stop me unless I let them. And there were quite a few times I did not. Nowadays though, the villagers are more numerous, their gossip spreads far more quickly, the pitchforks they wield have turned into guns, and the torches have become rocket launchers, so I try not to rock the boat more than I have to.

No sense in letting the entire world know that vampires actually do exist. Even if there is only one left. If I had my way, there would not even be one. But the way of how to end a vampire's life died with Ash, as did the way of how to begin one.

The young man's eyes glaze over instantly as he mechanically picks up the keys off the counter and moves stiffly in the direction of the front doors. I call out a weak apology in his direction that he does not notice and head to the elevators, swaying slightly with each step. He will snap out of it when he is done with his tasks and will probably be a bit slow, mentally, for the next few days. Hopefully that will be the extent of it. Strange though it is, I feel more badly for this young man than I do for all the dead men in my garage.

More, I worry at my loss of control. I do not normally manipulate people so blatantly with my abilities. I have always preferred a more subtle approach when going that route in the past, even when I was being lazy, and I have never done it without conscious effort on my part.

As I ride the elevator to the top floor, nausea adds itself to the mix and I sit down on the floor, clutching my stomach with one hand while covering my mouth with my other in fear that I will vomit. I try to focus my attention on the numbers telling me what floor I am on but have to soon clench my eyes shut when my vision blurs, causing me to see double and making my stomach want to leap from my mouth.

What the hell is wrong with me? My immune system is impregnable and I have not been sick once since becoming a vampire. I have walked for thousands of years through all sorts of disease, a few of which destroyed entire nations, and come out unscathed. Airborn viral infections, sexually transmitted diseases: none of them can affect me. Sure, an upset stomach and bouts of dizziness are small when compared to leprosy, ebola, and the like but, for me, small things of this nature are enough to shake my world to its foundations.

Fortunately, I make it all the way to the top floor with no one getting on the elevator with me. I doubt I would have the strength to stop them from getting me into an ambulance and carting me off to a hospital, where who knows what their tests would show about me.

The doors open and I stand, needing the rails along the inside of the elevator to drag myself up. I have only made it a few staggering steps outside the doors when a sharp pain in my stomach brings me to my knees and I stumble onto the carpeting in the hallway. It feels like a small demon is hacking away at my insides, and he has brought very sharp tools. Liquid pushes up in the back of my throat, and I am unable to stop myself from sicking up on the floor as a small blob of blood erupts from my mouth, landing thickly in a congealed pool on the carpet. It is only a little, maybe half a pint, if that, but the dizziness and nausea are momentarily forgotten as I take in the disturbing sight.

Obviously, I am upset that I am vomiting, not to mention the rest. That I am throwing up blood is the extremely disturbing part. It is not my own. I know what my own blood smells like. Aside from the smell of the blood on the carpet, which I do recognize, it has already begun to congeal, so I know that it belongs to the man I fed from earlier.

Now I am not going to go into great detail on the workings of my metabolism because I do not believe it is necessary to reveal how regular my bowel movements and such are, but my metabolism does work at a much, much higher pace compared to that of a human. It has been almost three hours now since I fed, so the blood should have long since been digested and broken down. There should be nothing in my belly to begin with for me to throw up, and I have never gotten sick from feeding before. Whoever I feed from could be riddled with all sorts of diseases and none of them would affect me. I am not sure exactly how it works. I only know that it does work, and that is enough for me.

Staring in horror and puzzlement at the mass of blood before me, I almost do not notice that my head is beginning to clear. The nausea downgrades to a vague queasy feeling in the pit of my stomach and I finally stand, taking a look at the crimson mess on the carpet one last time.

My steps are slightly shaky at first, but they become stronger with each move as my head steadies itself. By the time I reach the door to my room I am only feeling slightly queasy, uncomfortably so, but it is bearable, and I slip my key card in the slot, pushing down on the door handle to enter my room.

I flip on the light as I shut the door behind me, sparing a brief glance at the large room before heading straight to the bathroom. I turn the light on there as well and turn to look at myself in the mirror.

For the first time in ten thousand years, there is actually a change in my appearance. It is subtle and would likely go unnoticed to any eye but mine, but I am so used to seeing the same thing every time I look in the mirror that the irregularities jump out at me like a pop-up book.

My face has a slightly drawn, almost haggard look and I look quite pale. I have gone months without sleeping and eating before, coming out looking like the very picture of health. True, I do not look terrible now either, but even these minute changes are worrisome simply because they are not normal.

Still studying my reflection in the mirror, the bathroom seems to spin spastically as I am doubled over by a crushing pain in my abdomen, far worse than the previous. I can feel the vomit rising quickly in the back of my throat and I throw myself down on the floor as I flip the lid to the toilet seat up.

More blood hurtles from my mouth into the porcelain white commode. Not just a little, like last time. I estimate about six or seven pints of blood are floating in the toilet by the time I am done emptying the contents of my stomach. Probably most, if not all, of the blood I drank earlier.

A few more drops splutter from my mouth as my retching subsides, and I collapse onto the floor next to the toilet, curling myself up in the fetal position while clutching my stomach. The pain quickly fades, but I feel incredibly weak, weaker than I have ever felt before in my long life. And hungry beyond reason. I am tempted to dip my head in the toilet and drink the bloody toilet water, but I don't think I can move at the moment and the blood is likely what made me sick. Then there is my pride refusing to let me drink toilet water like a dog, so I remain curled up on the floor. I lie this way for a minute or so before I reach for the toilet seat, dragging myself up to a sitting position. It is another minute before I chance standing up, and I sway slightly from the effort of doing even that. The nausea is finally gone, though, which is a better than a small relief. I had almost forgotten what throwing up was like.

I grasp the edge of the counter by the sink with both hands to keep myself upright, taking deep breaths while I pray that my strength returns. I have no idea who I pray to. I do not follow any organized religions and, truthfully, I think most of them are foolish.

I actually met Jesus a few times. I kept hearing things about him and decided to seek him out to see if there was any truth to the rumors. There was definitely something special about him and he was a very kind man, but I am not sure if I think he was, in fact, the son of God. I am not disputing the claim, I simply saw nothing with my own two eyes to support it. The love that radiated from him to everyone was very genuine, though, and I felt very... accepted in his presence. I don't think he was a very big fan of organized religion either, based on things he said. I heard him speak a couple of times and the gist of his message could be boiled down to two things, really. One: love your neighbors. More importantly, I think, is the second: The kingdom of God is inside you. His second lesson always stuck with me.

Those who followed long after his death changed his teachings, along with the writings that came before, subtly in some ways, majorly in others, and took God out of man, putting him in an unattainable heaven, where he, or she as the case may be, is of no real use to anyone. Their reasons for doing so are only conjecture on my part, but if one thinks about it, the reasons should be quite obvious.

As for loving your neighbors, I have, in all the time I have lived, seldom seen more sanctioned hatred come from one institution. Divisiveness and dogma were not among his teachings, but kindness, love and acceptance were. I doubt Jesus would have been very pleased with the church's role throughout history, especially using him as a figurehead to support their claims and actions. Jesus could see his followers twisting his words, even then, and I could see that it bothered him immensely.

All religions are man made, and therefore flawed. This is one of the reasons, and there are others, that I don't follow a particular faith. It's not that I don't believe in something, I just don't think any one religion is right.

Someone must hear my prayers though, because my strength soon returns, and suddenly, I feel fine. Dandy, even. I look at myself in the mirror again and am more than a little relieved to see that my appearance has returned to normal as well, though I am still extremely tired. And ravenously hungry. Well, at least I don't look it. Ha. Yeah, I would laugh if the whole thing weren't so troubling and if I didn't feel like I would pass out on the floor at any moment.

A soft knock at the door announces the arrival of my 'bellboy'. I do not hurry when I move to answer the door as he will not go anywhere until he has finished his tasks.

I open the door and the poor young man is standing there, eyes still glazed over, holding my bag out with one hand with my keys in his other. I almost feel bad for what I am about to do next, considering what I have already done to him, but I am so hungry and tired. We all do what we must, though, and I am what I am.

As I take my bag and keys from him, his eyes snap into focus and I can see his awareness return, which is a good sign that there will be no lasting damage. He blinks a couple of times as he takes in his surroundings, his confusion apparent from his facial expression, "Wha-?"

I catch his eyes, loosing a measured amount of heat from my own, and pitch my voice so that he hears it as if I were speaking between his ears. "Thank you," I open the door further and gesture towards the bed, "Come inside and sit down."

The dilation of his pupils is immediate as my "suggestions" take hold of his mind, but they do not glaze over like they did earlier. This is the way it is supposed to work. He is under my control, but he can still think, in basic terms, for himself. His thoughts, words, and actions will be entirely his own, except for my specific commands. The other way is far more complete, but it is also far more dangerous for him, as I've stated before. He does not hesitate to obey my commands, but he smiles uncertainly at me as he steps into the room. I flash him a reassuring smile of my own before closing the door behind him and locking it.