Young Writers Society

More people had flocked to them, and Kaito had set off Kate again, and Télos was not responding. James has either acted far too quickly on a hasty assumption and been very wrong, or Télos was just too surprised to give a suitable answer.

James was willing to wait. He simply watched the others with mild, detached interest while he awaited Télos's reply.

Paige was shaking in her skin. She couldn't help but be slightly comforted by the girl's arm around her, but she was still struggling to keep up with people's names and things. If she was going to pretend these people were her friends, she should remember at least that much. There was no doubt Minnie was at least a bit suspicious, if not already pretty certain of Paiges lies.



Was he, Kaito, flirting with her?

If he really was one of Paige's friends there was no way she wouldn't have told them about the fire, or at least mentioned her by name as her ex at some point. She looked between Paige and Kaito confusedly. Her face visibly showing it.

What the hell was going on here?

Kaito faltered, if only for a moment.

He knew someone just like her. The similarities were actually a bit scary; both of them had a tsundere vibe, and both seemed to react to strangers in the same way. While a realization like that should have been alarming, Kaito found it almost comforting - Aleks wasn't impossible to handle once you actually got to know him.

"I was just trying to be friendly," he said with absolutely no antagonism whatsoever. He gave her a smile, too. Aleks would have gotten flustered if he knew the person giving said smile - Kaito couldn't remember what it was like the first time they met. Lexal still existing at the time didn't make the recalling any easier.


Télos really wasn't sure what he was supposed to do. He liked the idea Tiberius had, but he wasn't really sure he was supposed to go along with...whatever was going on between the two doll-like girls.

So he didn't focus on them.

He turned to Tiberius, who seemed to be the only one not really involved with what was going on.

Télos couldn't really give an answer to his earlier question, now that there were two girls who might have been vampires. He wasn't really sure how to judge who normally was and wasn't one - he was still trying to figure out how vampires acted.

...Then again...

Télos slowly glanced back at the two newcomers. If they weren't vampires, they'd probably be more worried about being vampires. But if he had ended up in this same situation with someone like Robra - ignoring everything else about their relationship - he'd definitely be a bit more concerned with Robra being there than being turned into a vampire.

Now to pick the right question.

...Oh, screw being subtle. He could make a sword. There was no need to tiptoe around it, especially when they easily outnumbered the two girls.

"Are you two actually vampires?" Télos said, keeping his voice low enough that only their little group could hear him. "Because if you theoretically were brought here against your will, and theoretically got turned into a vampire when you're something else, then I might theoretically know someone you can theoretically talk to."

A few feet away, Kaito gaped at him.


Lorcan still couldn't find Second.

He wasn't sure where he was supposed to look. He had tried scanning the crowd for him again and again, but he hadn't joined any groups. He wasn't lingering in another part of the room. He hadn't somehow turned into his other form without Hero being there - Lorcan had glanced at the floor multiple times.

So where was he?

All he could do now was wander aimlessly throughout the crowd, carrying two glasses that hadn't even been drunk out of. He felt a few hunger pangs, but hunger wasn't important right now. He had to make sure Second was alright.

That was what mattered.

“Open this door!” she barked. No response.

Adrid Idazi, officer of the Yaska City Guard, had cornered the violent thief. She was ready. She kicked open the heavy door, readied her spear-point, and cautiously stepped over the threshold.

In the space of a moment the city guard was no longer a justified intervener, but a purposeless intruder in a place of festivity.

She had emerged in a vast ballroom, airy, well-lit, and peopled by the expensively and bizarrely decorated.

She jumped.

Had- had that bastard been a mage? Surely a criminal of such petty calibre couldn’t spirit people away-

The alien nobles stood back, and stared at Adrid’s raised weapon, whispering behind embroidered gloves and fans. Not threatened whispers, or even offended- but bemused.

Her own clothes were strange, too- the guard uniform of her adopted city had vanished, replaced by a noblewoman’s garb from her native city.

A tall man with a curled moustache and a sickly yellow pallor approached her, glass still in hand, the other palm outstretched in a pacifying gesture.

“Please, Madam, there’s no need for that.”

The stranger made an attempt at pacifying her, but the elemental savagery of his razor sharp grin and lamp-like eyes suggested that she was lucky indeed that he bothered with such conventions.

In response to his maybe kindness, but mostly from the shock of her sudden displacement, the intruder attempted to act with some semblance of politeness.

Adrid slowly loosened her stance, and returned to a standing position. She ceased pointing the spear, but kept a careful grip on it. She resisted the urge to hug it. That would have been pathetic.

“Forgive me. I do not mean to be here.” she said, knowing how suspicious that sounded.

He smiled understandingly, and said something encouraging, but the words that left his mouth were lost completely, overpowered by the smell that carried on his breath.

The room was drenched in it. It permeated the guests, the curtains, the tablecloths. It swirled in coagulations in his glass, thick, heavy, overbearing. Blood.

Adrid’s eyes flew wide open. Cold sweat trailed down her face. Unwillingly she drew slow breaths, for with each breath the smell tunneled deeper and deeper into her senses, and lodged itself in her body as a frightful thirst. Newborn fangs itched to be christened.

She prayed it was some distortion in the light of the ballroom, but her skin, though still dark, had dulled in hue. Her once rich terracotta was now parched, sun-cracked earth. It was wrong. It was all wrong.

In time, the sound of the man’s voice faded back in. He seemed to have noticed Adrid’s fixation on his glass. “-It’s the Florence May- very tender specimen, Florence. Though you strike me as the type that may perhaps prefer, say… the Jonathan?”

Adrid snapped back into her stance, pointed her spear at the man, and backed away.

“Don’t come near me, filthy blood mage.” she spat like a curse.

She was surrounded by over a hundred beasts, and her armour was gone, but she was ready to butcher any one that came near.

He was giving the room another hopeless glance when he heard the woman speak from nearby. He had never heard the phrase "blood mage" before, but Lorcan knew magic. It was what normally coursed through his veins, and was what made him look like this.

And even if the words were spoken like a curse - with the same kind of tone people always used when they found out what Hero was the god of - Lorcan still changed his direction and headed towards the source of the commotion.

Most of the vampires hadn't noticed. Some were giving questioning looks, but it was just a handful - the majority were too absorbed in their own conversations.

"Hello," Lorcan softly said. The man, who had been giving the woman a very curious yet worried look, turned to conversation's newcomer. Lorcan felt his gaze sweep over him. He felt like his heart was going to jump out of his chest, and he really just hide himself away in his arms, but he had to keep strong.

He gave the man a calm smile.

He looked like a vampire. Everyone always said it. So why not take advantage of the gift he had been given?

"I can handle this," Lorcan said. There was a pause. The man was studying him. Lorcan stood his ground, desperately hoping that he could play the part of a convincing vampire.

And then he was gone, leaving Lorcan and the unnamed woman.

"Hi," Lorcan said. He kept his voice low; he didn't want to think about what would happen if they were overheard. "I'm Lorcan. You're not from here, are you? I just found myself at this party, looking like this. I know it's hard to trust a stranger in a situation like the one we're in, but I don't think drawing attention to yourself is a good idea right now."

He glanced around again.

He still couldn't find Second.

"I'm looking for my friend," he said. "He was just with me earlier. If you want, you could come with me while I look for him. We could talk and figure out how we got here and how to get back home."

James had only been at this vampire blood-drinking party for a mere few minutes and he was already tired. His face was blank as he heard Télos follow his own example and throw all subtlety out the window, asking the girls if they were actually vampires.

Now that was an assumption James wasn't willing to make - that everyone brought here wasn't normally a vampire. Sure, there had been people brought to the party against their will, ripped out of their worlds and brought to whatever reality this was, but in a crowd filled with vampires who consumed human blood for survival, he wasn't for a second going to consider admitting that he was normally a human. For all intents and purposes, he was a vampire in any world, and he always would be.

Without a word, he withdrew from the group just like he'd said he would. He'd already figured that the girls weren't from here. They seemed to lack the poise of most of the other vampires surrounding them. And whether or not that was enough evidence to base his assumption on, he wasn't going to stick around to see if he was right. He could figure it out later, and if Télos was wrong, he didn't know if he should be present to clean up that mess.

It wasn't really self-preservation at this point. He just didn't feel like dealing with that aftermath when he didn't even know why they were brought to this party in the first place.

So he weaved his way through the crowd, slowly and gracefully, excusing himself as he passed others who were in the way. It wasn't hard to put on airs and be polite. He was just trying to make his way back to the bar because though he'd been trying to avoid it, he realized the best way to fit in would be to do what everyone else was doing: drinking blood. He was pretty sure one sip would make him vomit, but he could pretend.

He also had a dreadful suspicion in his gut that a part of his now vampiric body would actually enjoy it.

That was when he saw the commotion up ahead.

A woman with a spear, in the middle of the crowd, being quietly mocked under hushed voices for being at the center of the scene. It was clear that she was terrified and out of her element, but it was unclear as to what exactly provoked her aggression. Whether or not it was because she'd been plopped into a different reality or because someone had tried to harm her (or whatever number of things could've happened), she... well, she deserved more compassion than she was getting. Then again, she was pointing her spear at anyone that moved. Thankfully, most people didn't seem to be paying much attention to her.

James found a spot at the edge of the crowd. It seemed like someone else had the same idea. A young man with black hair drew close and started speaking to her in a hushed voice.

Hm. Depending on how that went, he'd decide whether or not to interfere. He decided to walk past them instead, eyes on the bar.

Adrid's breath was sharp and uneasy, and her brow twitched with fear, but her stance remained still and perfect.

The stranger, Lorcan, moved only a centimeter closer. Adrid jumped back, and swiped at the air in front of her.

'Stay back,' "I'll cut you,' and other such phrases came to mind, but none of them came out.


What could she do to him, anyway? If he was what she feared he was, or even just what she was, he drew power from blood, and they were surrounded by it.

The man was an animal. So was she. He couldn't prove to her that he didn't belong to this place, but she couldn't have proved anything to him, either.


She stood to lose everything, whatever decision she made, and so, each one started to look about as good as another. Adrid considered. Spear the man now, get butchered by the crowd. No good. Give the man a chance, get betrayed later, spear him later, get butchered later. Workable.

With effort, Adrid un-froze, pulled back her spear, and approached Lorcan.


"Why not." she said, with the closest thing to composed nonchalance that she could muster. Her earlier impression had already ruined it, but the performance wasn't all too bad.

"My name is Adrid. Sorry for the... fuss."

The server was already watching James as he slid up to the bar, looking at the varying displays of bottles, labeled with the names of their victims. He kept his face a neutral expression, but his stomach twisted at the thought of this being normal amongst these vampires. Was this... vampire culture? Belittling the lives they took? Using the names of the deceased as an advertisement? You'd think the undead would have respect for the dead, but apparently it didn't work that way.

"See something that interests you?" the server asked, looking up from a glass he was drying.

James hummed. "I'm still considering my options."

The man nodded with understanding. Perhaps too much understanding. James wasn't sure what exactly there was to be understood, apart from him being indecisive.

"Are you a picky drinker, then?"

James scoffed lightly. "Any man of taste is."

Another nod. "Well, there's the Timothy, which can be quite charming if you're keen on a thicker texture. That one we have in the back-" he gestured to the back wall, which was lined with bottles. "-but I don't put it on display as much because it's more of a controversial taste."

James was exercising great self-control in keeping himself from gagging. The mere thought of thick blood being something to ingest made him want to run out of this godsforsaken ballroom. Instead, he just hummed with mild interest.

"Understandably so. I'm not much a fan of it either. I prefer my blood thin."

"Ah, then may I recommend the Elise? It's rather popular tonight."

The server lifted the bottle towards James, showing off the label. James wasn't sure if he was hungry or wanted to faint, but he figured he should say yes to something sooner than later. All this talk about blood was making him light-headed - though it was probably the smell more than anything.

"Sure."

"And if you don't like it, feel free to come back and taste a little here and there."

"Good to know. I might take you up on that." He wouldn't.

The server smiled, and then poured James his drink. Dark, red, and swirling just below the edge of the glass. When it was handed to him he smiled back with a thank you.

Gods, he hated this. Why did he have to be brought to a world full of vampires? Why did he have to be transformed into one? He wasn't even sure how vampires were expected to act, but from all the cues he was picking up on, they were all aristocratic, wealthy types with their noses in the air.

But in any case, it couldn't be avoided forever. The server was looking at him expectantly for a reaction as he held the glass, so he lifted it up, swirled it in his hand and went for it, taking a sip.

That was... just as bad as he thought it'd be. It tasted foul, and the thick smell of iron filled his nostrils, coated his tongue. But as he swallowed, he felt the strangest sensation of refreshment. Something that he had only ever once attributed to food or water.

"What do you think?" the server asked.

James didn't know what he thought.

"Good recommendation. Not bad at all."

Siren crawled out from under the bar, got her fins tangled up in her white gown, and sort of rolled in a bundle into some poor gentleman's feet.

The bundle looked up. What did she find there? It was her good friend James! How had they met again?

"James," she proclaimed, "It is James!" And she hugged his ankles.

So graceful was he, no more than a drip spilled from his cup. Opportunistically, Siren caught it on her tongue. Sparkles lit alight in her big, big, red eyes.

"With some grub juice," she said, "This would be perfect."

Minnie hugged Paige from the side, keeping her doll-like smile plastered to her face, ignoring the question directed towards her. Paige tensed and pressed further into the woman she was clinging to.

"I better get going," Minnie curtsied, "It was so nice meeting you, however, I have duties to attend to, farvel!" She turned and disappeared into the crowd, her posture and gait changing to match those around her.

Paige awkwardly stepped away from the ladies' side. Every inch of her skin that had been touched felt like it was burning, and she itched at her arm absentmindedly.

"Thank you, and I apologize," She laughed embarrassedly. You didn't even ask her name She thought to herself. That could've turned so ugly, so quick. "To answer your question," She turned to address Télos, dropping her voice a bit "No, I'm not usually craving human blood. As far as I'm aware my... friend, doesn't either."

James tensed as something hit his legs, but managed to keep his balance enough to not send the blood from his glass flying all over himself, or the bar, or anyone else.

He steadied himself as he looked down, surprised to see Siren, of all people, hugging his legs. He couldn't remember the last time they'd met, and hadn't expected to ever see her again, but was happy to nonetheless.

Though a merfrog, she looked like she'd been dressed for the occasion, and her eyes were red instead of their normal pitch black. It only just occurred to him that his own eyes might appear different in color. It wasn't like he'd be able to tell, with no mirror. And wasn't there something about vampires and mirrors? He couldn't recall.

A small smile graced his face, and this one was genuine.

"Siren, it's so good to see you," he said, resting his hand and glass on the bar for a moment, and he reached down to pat her head. "Are you doing alright? How long have you been hiding under there?"

Daisy said 'you're welcome' as soon as she'd been thanked, though she wasn't sure if the girl had heard her. That was alright. It was beyond rude to interrupt someone just to say something like that. It completely defeated the purpose of saying it in the first place.

"Oh, me neither," Daisy said, "I've got to say, this whole situation is a bit flustering. If we could just find the host of this party, though, I'm sure everything will be cleared up just fine."



Kate's scowl deepened, "Well don't," she said to Kaito, "I'm not some fucking pixy who wants to chit chat about nothing while I've got better shit to be doing. Namely, getting the fuck home. I don't want your fucking small talk."

Paige continued to scratch at her arm, turning towards the strawberry blonde next to her.

"I apologize for my rudeness, that girl was, is, my ex. We had a rather... firey breakup. She smiled, awkwardly, her arm was starting to develop a bit of redness from the scratching. "I never learned your name. Mine's Paige."

"It's alright," Lorcan reassured her. He looked around the room again, despite losing hope that he'd see his best friend by doing something as simple as that. Second must have left the room, but Lorcan didn't know why.

He opened his mouth to suggest they left the room to look for Second, but then he caught a glimpse of a strange-looking vampire near the table with the blood. She didn't look like anything he had ever seen before. Second was the strategist out of their trio, but he didn't have to think too long before realizing she had to be like him and Adrid.

And then he saw she was talking to a man who looked the part of a vampire - but the man seemed friendly with her. Lorcan couldn't help but give a relieved smile.

There were more people like them there.

"I think I just found more people like us," he said, gesturing in their direction. "I'm going to go talk to them. If you want, you could come with me?"

Lorcan looked at her for one more moment before heading over to the table.


If Kaito wasn't more concerned with what Télos had just done, he might have been a little more flustered by Kate's reply. But Kate's reply was something Aleks would have said - minus the part about the pixie's - so Kaito honestly wasn't that concerned.

"It's alright," Télos nonchalantly replied - completely unaware that the conversation was focused on Daisy. "I'm Télos, by the way. God of gold and ruler of the end because democracy takes way too long to put into place! Kaito is the guy with blue hair - he's my little brother's boyfriend, and also his chosen."

Télos let out a sudden sigh of relief.

"Still, thank Ether," he said. "Kaito, Daisy and I are all in the same boat as you, too. None of us are normally vampires-"

"Télos," Kaito interrupted in a panicked hiss; he had finally gotten over his initial shock at hearing the question. "You have to be more subtle."

"I can make a sword," Télos pointed out.

"Your sword might not work on vampires," Kaito replied, his voice barely above a whisper. "It would have just been a really fancy letter opener."

Télos faltered. "...I was right?" he hesitantly replied. Kaito had to resist the urge to groan. Télos had been, but what if he hadn't-

"Wait," Télos said. "Where did Tiberius go? He kept trying to ask me if we were in the same boat, but I couldn't say anything without knowing if you were like us."

He scanned the room. Kaito followed suit a second later, too. He eventually found Tiberius standing by the drinks table, talking to a girl that was...strange, even by the standards of what Kaito had seen recently.

Télos started heading to the table.

"Well," he said, "it's probably a good idea to group up."

Before Kaito had a chance to ask if he was planning on bringing Tiberius back or getting the entire group to go to him, Télos was already too far away to hear him.

Kaito, whose heart was still racing even after finding out the new girl was like them, rushed after him. Télos reached Tiberius with no problem, but Kaito wasn't so lucky. Just as he was about to reach the god's side, he found himself walking only inches away from a vampire.

Kaito froze. The vampire did, too. He knew he should say or do something, but he was too terrified to speak. The vampire looked like a more traditional vampire: long black hair, a white, billowing shirt, and a sharp pair of fangs.

"Oh," Kaito managed to get out. "Hi."

There was a pause. The vampire muttered the greeting back, and then added - albeit awkwardly - a hesitant, "What kind of blood is that?"

Kaito glanced down at his glass. "Uh, Elizabeth," he managed to get out. "What about yours?"

The vampire glanced down at his own drink.

"Charlotte," he replied. He looked just as uncomfortable as Kaito felt.