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Title from "Monsters" - Matchbook Romance

"What's good today? Hmmm..."

Gerard sniffed the air, Frank doing the same. A strong aroma of rich, fresh, uncontaminated, blood filled their nostrils.

"Mmm, smell that Gee?"

"Yeah, come on... Let's go."

The smell led them to a high school.

"How're we gonna get anyone from there?"

"Uhm... The bathroom?"

"Gerard?!"

"Fine, we'll wait outside a classroom."

"This used to be my school..."

"Are you okay with feeding from here?"

"Yeah, there's no one here but teachers and after school groups right now. Plus, I didn't have many friends that didn't just want to beat me up. Uhhhgg, let's hurry, I'm feeling light-headed."

Both of the boys' eyes were bright red. They didn't have much blood in them anymore. The lady at the front desk made them sign in, so Frank had to pose as "visiting teachers for home-schooling material information".

"This is where most of the school groups are."

After almost 10 minutes of near-passing out, a boy came out of one of the 10th grade classrooms. Frank walked over to him, trying to look young, stupid, and helpless.

"Excuse me; can you help me with my locker?"

"Uh, sure..."

The boy followed Frank over to the set of lockers near Gerard, who put him in the feeding trance.

"Shh, drag him over here..."

"Okay, hurry, there will be more people coming out soon. You go first Frankie..."

After Frank was done, Gerard started, but was interrupted, his ultra-sensitive ears pricking at the sound of footsteps. He raised his head, sniffing, as Frank's eyes also snapped down the hallway. Leaning the kid against the wall, he shoved Frank in the small space between locker sections.

"Stay here. You hear that right? Someone's following us..."

Gerard was suddenly over at the corner down the hall they'd come from, almost 50 feet away. He waited a few second before lashing out, grabbing something Frank couldn't see, but could hear, the tiny whimper no human could possibly pick up from that distance. He could also hear the blood rushing faster in whatever it was Gerard had caught.

"Why are you following us?!"

"I-I..."

Frank recognized the voice, Cody. He ran over to Gerard who had the sandy-blond haired kid by the shirt. Cody was obviously frightened by Gerard's sternness. Frank just wondered if the boy had seen them eat.

"Why?"

"I, I was just curious! Please, don't hurt me!"

"Why would I hurt you?"

Gerard's eyes narrowed suspiciously, wondering the same thing as Frank.

"Because I was following you!"

"I just wanted to know why. Now did you hear or see anything more?"

"N-no! I didn't, I just saw you come in here. I swear!"

"Ok, Frank, you talk to him. I'll be back in a second."

Frank distracted the still-shaking Cody while Gerard went back to finish what he had started.

"So... When did you start following us?"

"Well, I was coming back and there police cars were driving out of there, but you weren't in there, so I just waited. You didn't notice me when you came out, so I just followed you. I wasn't spying of anything!"

"Good."

"What happened to you? You've got like bandages all over! That happened while I was gone for 30 minutes?"

"Uh... Yeah, we, um, fell... Both of us..."

Gerard came back, wiping his mouth.

"Okay, let's go... I think the camera saw us..."

"Saw you doing what?"

"Nothing, let's just go... No! This way is better... Yeah..."

He steered them out of the building and back toward the cemetery.

"So, are you still getting home schooled?"

"No."

"You don't go to school? Awesome!!!"

They were once again sitting in headstones. Suddenly a dark figure moved in trees. It was a boy, about Frank's age, wearing black jeans and a black and red t-shirt Frank couldn't quite see, even with inhuman senses. He had black, medium-thick rimmed glasses and spiky-ish, long brown hair. His hands were in his pockets. He stopped between two trees and looked at them, his expression pained, then looked away and kept walking. Frank expected him to appear on the other side of the tree, but he didn't.

"Gerard, who was that?"

"Mikey..."

"But..."

Frank immediately paused, seeing Gerard shake his head, eyes red and angry.

"It's haunting me... I've lived with seeing glimpses of him every now and then for 50 damn years, Frank... It fucking h-hurts..."

"What?! How can you be 50?!"

Cody, please, not now..."

"But, Frank-"

"Gerard, look!"

Mikey was running toward them, now from the front gate, as if something was chasing him. He stumbled and fell, flipping over onto his back a few feet from Frank. He was crawling backwards and kicking at the air in front of him, at some foe only he could see. Gerard winced as Mikey cried out, blood suddenly dripping from massive jaw-sized holes in his ankle, his mouth open exposing completely bared fangs. He turned and looked at Gerard sadly, before he spoke.

"I'm sorry Gerard..."

His voice was small, weak, but mostly frightened. Frank could hear the guilt and shame in his voice, his mind whirling at the sound of an agonized voice that was so similar to his own. Gerard whimpered suddenly.

"Mikey..."

Mikey reached toward Gerard before being torn away, the image disappearing. Gerard's eyes were now letting tears flow freely, blurring the glowing red in them.

"God, Gerard, you've seen that before? Shh, it's okay... well, no it's not. Cry all you need."

Frank was instantly at his friend's side, rubbing his shaking back. Cody sat there, mouth hanging open.

"No, I'm fine... I just- I c-cant stand it anymore... He was so young, a-and just ripped away from m-me like that... I miss him s-so bad. For 50 years I've had to w-watch him like...that..."

"Is he dead?"

"No, but I think... death, is probably better that where he is now..."

"I would think getting your leg ripped off counts as a "potentially deadly threat", but he was in pain."

"It's because he was taken by someone who sort of made it so that he could never die, but he could feel the pain of death anyways..."

"God... Someone took him?"

"He was actually sold over... After I'd been banished, he refused to feed, so they j-just kicked him out to die. He was so weak that he just lay in the ditch next to a road. It's a miracle he even survived that long... Our real parents found him and like flipped out because we were both supposed to be dead... So th-they brought him to someone who called himself a "wizard" or whatever, to be his slave. And now that bastard can do w-whatever he wants with Mikey... My parents only brought him there because when they found him, they ch-checked to see if he was dead and saw his fangs..."

"But the... "wizard", he was human?"

"Yeah."

"So he's dead?"

"No, I don't know how, but he's not apparently..."

"Why don't you try and find him?"

"I have... those h-headaches I get... they sometimes show me s-stuff..."

Cody stood up, half scared and half confused.

"What the fuck are you talking about, and who the hell is Mikey? And who was that fag on the ground?"

Gerard instantly had his hand around Cody's throat, disappearing from the gravestone, his eyes burning, fangs bared.

"Don't ever talk about my brother that way, /comprendere/?"

"Okay, Okay, I'm sorry!"

Gerard released Cody with a shove. Cody trembled but didn't move from that spot. Frank glared at Cody.

"You'd also better not going around telling people about us... We already got shot... twice today..."

"You're one of them too?"

"Yeah..."

"Oh my god, are you those murderers on the news that killed all those kids?!"

Frank's eyes involuntarily flashed red.

"No! Why does everyone say that?!"


"Sorry man, don't eat me!"

"We don't eat people!"

Gerard snorted, still a little annoyed.

"We could you know... early ancestors did until they found out there was a more... humane way..."

Frank shuddered. It was still only 2:00 PM.

"Gee? Did your brother have a mate?"

"No, he was straight though. But he never found anyone and was too young to be paired randomly."

"How old was he?"

"15 when he was turned. Like you."

"Mm... I see."

"Ow."

"Oops."

After accidentally flicking a rock in Gerard's eye, Frank let Gerard bring them to a cheap restaurant downtown with Gerard's little amount of money he got from the job he rarely went to and was surprised he still had. They dropped Cody off and returned to the cemetery.

"Do you have a phone Gerard?"

"Yeah, but why would I need it?"

"I dunno..."

They spent hours inside before going back outside to feed on some unsuspecting college student smoking outside his car. They spent the next hour outside kicking pebbles and rocks around the mausoleum. Gerard had another mind-exploding headache, but this time recovered with a different expression on his face.

"I know where Mikey is."