Immortality.

So, this has been wrote for my English coursework and that is why it's so entirely AU and OOC becuase the characters, orgionally, had different names. But I needed feedback so the names - Richard and Simon - have been changed to Remus and Sirius - sorry if I haven't changed some of them!

Sirius; the guy talking.

Remus; the vampire.

Part I: Introduction.

Immortality.

A distant, unobtainable dream. A desire that any man on this planet would go to the ends of the earth for; a desire that men scurry through their pitiful lives trying to find... but hardly ever do. First was this idea of religion and the belief in some higher power that could grant them that eternal damnation, for essentially, that is what it is. And now, they have their science, with their atoms and cells and all the scientific-babble that is getting them no-where, and is going to get them no-where.

For there is only one way into immortality.

Humans were closer the first time. There is a higher power. A power that watches over them; destroys them; makes them; loves them; hates them; and can grant that damning kiss they so covet. And all without them ever knowing.

Why, I'm talking about vampires of course.

Vampires? you scoff, turning your twenty-first century nose up at the very idea that there is something science has failed to reveal, something that science cannot reveal for it does not understand. But yes, vampires. The soul-sucking, blood-draining, stone-cold corpses, you so romanticise these days in fiction and films, turning us – the undead, the devil's minions, the messengers of Death himself – into nothing more than cheap porn stars.

And you wonder why we kill you, why we so relish in doing so!

Let me tell you of a time when vampires were believed in, when vampires were thought of as the horror we are. Let me tell you about the time I was turned, the time I gave my soul to the devil in return for the bliss I thought immortality would be.

Well, it is no bliss.

It is agony.

Never-ending, excruciating, crippling agony.

I would choose Death, if only Death would have me.

Part II: The Thief

The year was 1190, Richard the Lionheart was just beginning his reign; the country was prospering and religion held the hearts of everybody in its icy, suffocating grip.

I was seventeen, the son of a slum-doctor and living life like there was no tomorrow. I made my way through the years, laughing in the face of Death on so many occasions, narrowly escaping execution time and time again.

It was... exhausting, exhilarating but very exhausting. I had no time to frown on the painful, intolerable mistakes of the people around me, I had no time, no will to become anything more than I already was.

A slum-boy.

I laughed. I spent my childhood laughing, trying to laugh away the circumstances in which I lived, trying to laugh away the severe social structure which kept me pinned down. I laughed to live.

I was everything, when I was young. Sometimes a thief; sometimes a smooth-tongued gentleman; sometimes a healer's son and, very occasionally, a murderer. I took no great pleasure in snuffing out life for I had been brought up to regard life with the highest possible measure. But I got paid. I got money. Food. Sometimes even water. And that was more important to me than some... some stupid moral that nobody, except my father, kept to.

Perhaps that was what drew him to me? My keenness for life, yet my total coldness and determination with which I carried out the murders? I'm not proud of them. I never was. It was necessary on the occasion. It's what humans do... It's how they move up in the game that is life, it's how they survive. It's one of the rules.

But enough about my childhood, now, about the past that I try to forget. It tires me. Let's move on to the first time I met him.

I was in a tavern, seventeen summers old, sat by myself in the corner with a mug of ale in front of me. I was a thief that night, knife in my pocket; grim smile on my face.

It was raining outside, a heavy mist was coiling around the maze of streets but the mood of the tavern was loud and raucous, men with heavy beards clanging cups together with hearty declarations of love, loyalty and faith. Despite the noise and life of the people, all eyes still flicked to him when he pushed the door open. Even with his shoulders huddled and his head bent, he was taller than any man there. A cloak was draped around him like some fine, expensive velvet and the glint of a sword was obvious on his belt, hand resting against it.

My eyes travelled with him to the bar, thinking only of how a rich-man had dared to enter this tavern, and how he was mine tonight. I didn't take in the fluidness with which he walked, the almost feline like quality nor the presence he oozed – that something that made me want to go to him.

Drink in hand, he leant against a wall, eyeing the dirty-looking liquid suspiciously before letting his gaze roam around the room. I stared into the shadows where his face was hidden and he made his way over to me after a moment's pause. Exactly like I'd planned.

He sat down without invitation, staring – or at least, that was the impression I got – at me the whole while. His movements were exaggerated, mocking... As though he was somehow above human movement, somehow better than it all. His movements, at the time, simply seemed like that of a very rich man. Remember, I'd never seen a rich-man before – not as rich as this one appeared to be – and it was like I'd imagined them to walk; arrogant and like they owned the entire damn world.

"Evening," he said, voice all soft and gentle as he lowered the hood. His eyes were the first thing I noticed; they were golden. A startling, hard gold that looked almost feral rimmed with the black liner – another exotic touch. Then I noticed his mouth... the plumpness to his lips... and I wanted to reach over and run a thumb over them, to see if they were as silky as they looked. Or better yet, I wanted to kiss them. His hair, too, seemed to demand for me to touch it, to run my fingers through it to see if it was real. It was a strange sandy colour that fell in loose curls about his face and shoulders, a contrast to my own that was as black as the gates of Hell and barely brushed my chin, though it too falls in simple curls.

I'd simply nodded, too dazed – awed, is probably a better word – to answer him at first. He was... smooth, fine. Living in the slum, men were large boorish creatures with bristly beards, think noses and huge, muscled bodies. This man before me was a contrast to everything I was used to – smooth cheeks, washed hair, slim build, narrow shoulders and long, elegant hands that had probably never lifted a weapon in their life nor ever needed to.

"What's your name?" he tried again, voice still polite and unassuming and somehow managing to carry over the din of the tavern.

"Sirius."

He nodded, hand curling around his glass. He was very pale, I noticed in that instant, paler than anybody I'd seen before... even paler than some I'd seen after a blood-letting. "Remus," he replied.

No matter how many times I look back, how many times I wonder, I can never remember why I walked away in that instant, why I refused myself the luxuries his purse could've bought me. Perhaps it was God at work? Perhaps God has always wanted me to be cursed to Hell and it's all in His 'Divine Plan'? For if I had tried to cut Remus' purse that night, there is no doubt that I would've been the first of Richard's victims in modern-London and died before he decided to turn me. Perhaps I didn't believe enough in Him, for that I am certainly guilty of, and he wanted me punished for my disobedience by forcing me to endure eternity? But no matter, that is a story for another time.

Part III: The Healer's Son

It was the night after that I accompanied my father to see a man that was raving with all sorts of hallucinations, and had terrible marks upon his neck and thigh. The family had worked themselves into some sort of hysteria and when we first arrived, several women had already fainted and the young boys were walking around with gaunt, serious faces, tears in their eyes and the weight of the world upon their shoulders.

Just how humans react to anything they don't understand! Or can't understand. Or even, on the bare occasion, don't want to let themselves understand. They run around like the world is going to end! Havoc! Chaos! they scream with their shrill little voices, arms high in the air instead of actually thinking for once in their lifetime.

After pushing our way though the mourning family, my father and I finally fell to our knees beside the dying man. His skin was mottled grey and a sheen of sweat covered his face. "Fever," my father muttered to me, hastening to unfasten the man's shirt so he could see the neck-wounds more clearly.

It was the first ever vampire bite I saw, though I realised not what it was at the time.

The wound itself was like the bruises whores often walked around with – a love bite, as you would say in modern terms – and the teeth marks... They were two, perfect puncture wounds, not yet scabbed over.

I remember reaching out two fingers and resting them against the wound, somewhere in the back of my mind registering that the space between these was that of my canines. I remember the man twitching when I did, twisting his neck so the wound was accessible for whatever reason. A vampire trick – an impression – as I know now.

I put a little pressure on it. Why? I don't know.

Then man's hand snapped up instantly and he grabbed my wrist, eyes flying open as he stared up at me, hyperventilating. "G-gold e-eyes-," the man gasped, chest heaving underneath the thin material of his shirt, "Big, g-gold eyes. A-and s-soft lips. Soft lips. I wanted – wanted to touch them? That's why – why he did – did this-"

I shared a glance with my father.

"Vampire!" the dying man cried, body convulsing with the effort it was taking him, "Vampire! Beware!"

His hand went limp around my wrist.

I never looked back.

Part IV: The Gentleman

I was at a party some weeks later, to celebrate a wedding of one of the local nobles; my father being important enough to warrant an invitation. That night, I was loitering in the background and listening to people chattering to each other about the 'vampire-outbreak' as I was still very shaken by the ill-man that had given me the warning the night before.. Since he had died, three other bodies had been found – each with the 'Kiss of death' – as people had taken to call it – in various places on their bodies. The neck seeming to be the favoured place.

The religious – the believers – all argued that it was the work of God punishing us for our sins, they believed completely in the vampire argument. They walked around with rough, ugly sewn wooden crosses around their necks; clasped tightly in hands, they muttered quiet prayers whenever anybody they didn't know got too close. And some, those that could afford such a luxury, had garlic strung around their necks, or stuffed in pockets.

And then there was the select few – I amongst them – that scorned the idea of God and refused to believe in any such thing as vampires. Oh, how I laughed at those religious people that night!

Then I saw him. Remus, swinging some girl around on the dance floor, long hands covered by red-velvet gloves. He was no longer hidden away in a cloak, but dressed in some fine shirt open at the neck, a red cape clasped to his chest and a gold-studded leather belt tight to his hips.

The shiver that ran down my spine when I saw him flying – figuratively, vampires cannot fly – with that girl!

He pressed her close rather suddenly, dropping his head to whisper in her ear.

The song stopped and he glanced towards me, lips stretching back in a smile that was almost timid. Gold eyes... Vampire... Beware... "Hello, Sirius," he said, offering a hand for me to shake, having seemed to glide around the people still dancing, "Nice to see you again."

"And you, Remus." I took the hand, marvelling at how perfect his bare skin was this close up, how flushed his cheeks seemed, how bright his eyes gleamed! "Have you heard the local rumours?"

I missed the slight change to his demeanour; the sudden stiffening of his shoulders; the shift of his eyes; the frown that passed by his face. "I have," he replied cautiously.

Of course, it only seems cautiously now when I look back, at the time he sounded merely concerned.

"A vampire infestation! Honestly!"

His lips twitched; face softening again, "You do not believe such tales then?"

"I cannot say I do. If God wanted to punish us, then surely He Himself would punish us and not deign the task to some creatures of Hell?"

We had carried on much in this manner for the best part of two hours, gradually making our way to the bar where he bought me drink after drink – and yet never bought one for himself; another tiny detail I notice only now. We talked for most of the night, stopping, every now and then to go and dance with different young-girls to be polite.

I think he walked me back that night, pointing out odd constellations in the sky and commenting every now and then on how dreary English weather was and how he so wished for the brilliant sky of Italy again. But he had plied that much alcohol upon me, I must admit my memory of that night is severely tarnished and rather dream like.

If he fed from me at all, I do know about it for he never mentioned it and I never asked, but knowing the mind-tricks vampires can play upon humans as I do now, knowing how easy it would've been for him to pause for a moment – the slightest second – and look as though to whisper to me, or kiss me as lovers are wont to do, then it is probable that he did indeed feed.

I only wish I could remember it.

Part V: The Murderer

The next time I saw him was when I was carrying out a paid-murder for a father's friend three nights later. It was a man that had often plagued my father's friend; stealing, mainly. He'd been... tolerated before. But then he'd raped the wife of the man and she'd killed herself.

Then I'd been signed up with the promise of new clothes.

I'd stalked the rapist into some dark alley, where I then melted into the shadows, darkness enfolding around me like some fantastical velvet cloak until he could not see me though he was staring straight at me. I will admit, against my will perhaps, that I enjoyed this stalking. This quiet hunt of predator and prey. This idea that I held life and death in my clammy, shaking hands. I still feel that now. Killing is my only pleasure.

He knew he was being followed.

The vampire-obsession of the people had grown – four bodies in two days – and now even the most ferocious, most degrading, most corrupted of all men were starting to get scared.

He thought I was a vampire.

Eventually, he turned away, steps muffled by the dirt road, hand on his knife.

I waited...

Five...

Four...

Three...

Two...

One...

I lunged from my hiding place, knife in hand, teeth set in a tight grimace.

But he was ready for me. God only knows how, but he was.

With one huge hand, he knocked me spinning into a wall. I struggled to my feet, head ringing as he bore down on me. I slashed at his stomach and he jumped away though I snagged the material and the tiniest amount of red welled form the cut.

He snarled, pulling his dagger free of his belt and galumphing towards me with it high above his head. I took a step back and reached for his neck with my knife, but it was no good. He kicked me in the groin and I

stumbled against the wall, legs giving way as I groaned.

I saw the knife.

I saw the metal.

I saw my life.

I saw death.

But I didn't meet Death.

For just as the knife was about to bite into my neck, white hands appeared around the man's chest, legs wrapped around his waist and a face appeared above his shoulder.

Remus...

I sagged backwards, head knocking against the wall for a second time as I watched on, mouth open, eyes wide, fear long since gone as Remus smiled once, baring his canines and then... then fed upon the man in front of my very eyes!

I heard the skin tear.

I saw the teeth slide in.

I smelt the blood!

I gagged.

But I couldn't look away. Some horrified fascination made me clamber on my hands and knees to where they'd sank to the floor, some strange feeling made me touch Remus' shoulder; made me put a hand over the man's chest – the rapid heartbeat – and feel it fighting... slowing... stopping... Dead.

Remus licked his lips. Then he looked up at me, once again the gentleman I knew not the vicious killer he had just revealed.

I couldn't speak. My throat had constricted and my mind had gone blank. Instead, I reached out and stroked his lips with my thumb – like I'd longed to before. I stared at the blood that had wiped off for a long moment before I went to put in my mouth, to see what it tasted like, to see why he drank it so. But Richard grabbed my wrist, the movement so fast I didn't even see it. He shook his head, nibbling his bottom lip. I could see the canines again. I touched them; felt them; pressed by thumb against their point; gasped when it broke the skin and blood poured into his mouth.

Shock.

Horror.

That's what any normal human-being should feel. They should run screaming, screaming mercy to God. They should start praying and begging for their lives! They shouldn't kneel in the mud by a dead man and feel the vampire's fangs that had killed him!

Cold. Numb. Void.

That's all I had felt from that moment on.

Part VI: The Beginning

My father took me to church the next morning, saying something about the body count and how we'd best go just in case. I laughed, as always. Church was... nothing to me. I didn't believe in it, I didn't trust it and I certainly didn't set much store by it.

Slumped down in a pew at the back, I couldn't stop playing the night before over and over in my mind, hands clasped tightly together to stop them shaking. The anger that had twisted that man's face! The anger that had been the result of the fight for his life! And then... then the realisation, the understanding when the fangs had sunk in. The resignation!

Remus' fangs... Shudder. Blood dripping all over his mouth, my blood from my thumb, and yet he'd sat there, as still and as silent as Death is prone to be, as though he wished not to scare me! He'd stood me up, gently lifting me to my feet, pushing damp hair out of my eyes and trying to smile. "You're safe. I'll make sure you're safe," he'd whispered once, almost sadly; desperately, before he'd... vanished, melting into the night like some spectral entity.

Why did a vampire care about my safety?!

Why did a vampire care if I lived or died?! What was I to him but cattle?!

A voice floated back to me from the front of the church, then, a voice unassuming and quietly polite. A familiar voice. My head snapped up.

Remus!

But no...! No,he's a vampire! Vampires can't go out in sunlight! Vampires can't go into Church! And vampires most certainly cannot read from a Holy Bible of all things!

I felt a tug on my wrist. I blinked. I'd stood up, fists clenched, mouth open as I stared at the angel before me. A vampiric angel, with silken lips hiding the teeth of the devil and a beautiful facade to hide the mask of brutality he really is.

I fell back onto the pew.

So that was it. Unless Remus wasn't the vampire that was plaguing the slums and I had dreamt the night before – or perhaps added a little too much of that herb to my ale (magic mushrooms, to you) – then here was the final proof, the final test that God did not exist. Surely, if He did, He would not allow the Devil's children to play within His house?

I had felt strangely... drained, as that knowledge had sunk in. Strangely empty, as though I had believed in Him all my life. I barely listened to the words Remus spoke, dazed; trapped within my mind.

Once the sermon was over, and the congregation making its way outside, Richard caught up to me. I tried to hurry onwards, not yet ready to face him knowing what he was, knowing what that agonisingly beautiful face was hiding.

But he caught me. Hands gloved again, he gripped my elbow tightly and excused me from my father. He pulled me to a side and bent his head low – only to speak in my ear – but how my heart beat then! How the adrenaline kicked in! "I wondered, perhaps, if you would like to visit the place I' m staying at the moment?" he asked, "We have a very nice cook there, or so I'm told." He smiled like it was some private joke.

I stared at him. I was stood – on sacred ground – having a conversation with a vampire about going to his house after seeing him murder a man only the night before!? The absurdity of it all! I had wanted to laugh in his face, had wanted to disappear into the crowd – even though he would be able to track me perfectly - which I realised not at the time - and never speak to him again!

Yet I nodded politely all the same, keeping such thoughts to myself as I followed him round the graves. Oh, how convinced was I that he was leading me to some dark, bone-filled crypt! He did not, of course, he led the way to a path that I'd never been down before. It was a tunnel of trees with branches that had long since twined together, creating a canopy of wood and thus leaving little light to fall on the ground below. Eerie.

He led me through there in complete silence, allowing me to walk behind him and stare at his back; to take in the leather trousers; the carefully made boots; the shiny belt and the muscles that were visible through his shirt. He gave me chance to get my thoughts straight about him – as was probably the plan all along – and did not talk even to inquire after my well being. Thinking on it now, he must've been so paranoid with me behind him! I, the only human to know what he was, (an assumption, I must admit. After all, for all I knew, Remus went around befriending humans all the time and saving them from assassinations-gone-wrong) walking behind him! I could've done anything! I could've run! (And to this day, I do not think he would've stopped me.) I could've stabbed him the back! (Both figuratively and literally though we all know how that would've turned out.) But I thought at the time, as I am sure of now, that it was a sign of his trust for me. A sign to reassure me.

It worked. If he had followed me down that darkened path, I certainly would've come to hate him for the fear I felt was so acute it was making my very head swim!

He stopped, eventually, besides some quiet river where he proceeded to point out to me the obscure grey wall of a castle nestled between trees and a stretch of grass some way down from where we stood. "Let's go there," he said to me, at once sounding as though he was asking if I wanted to but also sounding like I had no choice upon the matter, "It gets the best sunlight around this time and I am sure you would appreciate to feel the warmth of the sun upon your back."

"Will it not-" I stopped, perplexed. How did you ask somebody if the sun would bother them because you thought they were a vampire?! I must say that I was doubting my own conclusion already. I cleared my throat, "Do not you find the sun – uncomfortable, sir?" I asked eventually, voice lowered as though I was discussing some deadly secret or vile embarrassment.

He laughed, leading me towards the grassy patch. "No more than it bothers you, Sirius."

"And religion doesn't bother you, either?"

He seemed delighted by my questions! "In the ways it makes men act, it bothers me greatly," he mused, "But religion in general causes me no pain and wild garlic is something I delight in having in my garden," he added with a small wink.

I paused, turning as to look at him. With the sun streaming down across his face and glinting off his hair, highlighting the shadows to his cheeks and the glint to his unusual eyes he looked like no human I'd ever seen. Standing there before me he looked like some wonderful apparition from the fantastical tales I'd been told as a young boy. In that moment he didn't look human. No matter how human he sounded, no matter how much his features looked human, no matter how human-like his movement; he wasn't human. He was a mockery of human-life.

"So what are you?"

He smiled at me, showing the very tips of those fangs. I expected them to be covered in blood! I don't know why but I was almost shocked that they were pearly white and spectacularly clean without any sign of what he'd done the night before! "I'm exactly what you think me to be."

We had reached the grassy-ledge by that point and he stopped, standing with his back to the river to observe me for a little while. We stood like that for five or ten minutes, talking about menial and general topics that were of no concern to me. But there was something in the way he was watching me, something in the way he kept biting his lip that was so deliciously human!

Then, when the menial chatter had run out, he simply stared at me – eyes moving up and down my form as though he were viewing a cow that was for sale in the market. When at last he moved, it was to reach out a hand and clasp my shoulder. The movement was so unexpected, however, and his stillness so complete beforehand, that I started at the touch with a wild curse! He briefly frowned again.

He let go and seemed to take a deep breath, coming to some decision within his mind.

"Stay with me tonight?" Stay with me forever...

We both knew that that is what he meant. We both knew he was offering me man's eternal want; man's eternal dream, that he was holding out his hand for me to join him in the hard clench of immortality.

I didn't answer at first. Instead I stared past his shoulder to the seemingly calm river beyond – a pleasant masquerade for the turmoil of currents beneath – and I watched as some poor duck battled its way upstream. Meaningless. Utterly meaningless. Yet I always remember that duck. I always remember the way he refused to give up. I thought at the time, that, perhaps, it was a sign from God that He wanted me to keep on fighting my way though life and not give in to the easy way out. But like I said, utterly meaningless.

My eyes flicked back to Remus' expectant expression. He was still, so still! And looking at me such controlled emotion!

Did I want immortality?

Of course I did. Ask any man on this planet and he would give up everything for a chance such as this.

Men, as I have already discussed, want to live forever. Men believe that living forever is a good thing; that it's something to aspire to. That it's something that will benefit them! Oh wrong they are. But, of course, I did not realise it at this point.

Did I want to abandon God?

A God I did not believe in, a God I could not believe and would not believe in? Why, it would be no hard chore, no harder than anything else I've done in my life. No harder, perhaps, than waking up in the morning.

And what was eternal damnation to somebody who would never die?!

Oh, if only I had realised what eternity meant! If I had only known what it would entail. How it would chip away at my demeanour until there was nothing left but a broken, bitter shell. Until I had lost everything.

If only I had stopped to think!

But thinking... Thinking isn't the human way of moving through life and I was fatally human.

"Yes," I said eventually, looking steadily into his eyes, "Yes, I'd like that."

A grin broke across his face, completely destroying any motion of the coldness I'd felt from him. He pulled me into a rough and clumsy hug, laughing delightedly and appearing so entirely human!

I can understand now the relief that he felt. I can understand just why he was so happy. For eternity is lonely and it is only the brief friendships with others of our kind that offer any real respite. I've spent the last few decades trying to hate him for granting me this gift, I've tried to despise him and curse his name.

But I cannot.

I loved him far too much for that and I can understand only too well the need he would've felt for a companion; for somebody to share his dark secret with. I can understand the extent of his pain for that is what I feel now. But I refuse to turn any other for as much as I despise mankind and all they stand for, I could not bring one those piteous creatures to my side even if I was granted an audience with Death in return.

But I am getting away from the point.

"I'm never going to let you go," he whispered in my ear, arms tight around me, with the insane grin on his face that made him look like some excitable young boy. I did not know the cause of his intensity but I know now, and I smile along with him as I remember just how infectious his happiness was!

"Oh, my love," he said, standing back but leaving an arm around my shoulder, "You will know the luxuries and wealth of kings! You will learn to see the world anew and you will learn the greatest pleasure of all!" he declared grandly. He was talking about the taking of blood, though of course, in my naivety I thought he meant more... carnal pleasures.

He led me back to his castle; his domain, laughing and joking in a light-hearted fashion I hadn't realised he possessed. Oh, how carefree I was then! So pleased that I could make this exotic, rich and beautiful man laugh! And what a laugh it was! Deep, and made of perfect notes that felt like a soft, gentle caress.

And is this fashion he showed me the castle; gave me over to the cook and then left.

Part VII: The Turning

He did not dine with me that night. But what was I expecting? For him to sit opposite me with an empty plate and a warm smile? Perhaps. He had gone to feed himself, I think. In fact, I knew, deep down that that was where he'd gone but I could not bring myself to admit it.

For this is the life I was walking into with a grin about my face and my heart wide open.

A life of murder.

In fact, I didn't see him at all that night. As I later found out, he was so scared, so nervous about what he was to do with me, that he'd spent hour after hour running through the woods and purging them of all the thieves they held. That night he'd been a fearsome phantom with blood-tears running down his cheeks, and wearing a mask of anguish.

I spent the time wandering the castle in which he lived until, at last, I stumbled upon the library. Understand that this was the first time I had ever seen any type of 'book' within my short life time. I could not read. I could not write. And the letters – titles of the books, fine, carefully printed names upon a map – all of which looked like nothing more than patterns to my untrained eye, had such an effect on me, I could not think, let alone move for ten minutes! I stood instead, leant against the doorframe with a hand pressed to my forehead.

That was one of my very last human experiences. One of my very few precious memories that seems, now, tainted and so very bleak without any of the detail of supernatural vision.

And not once during this last, fragile human night, did I see Remus. Not once did he come to reassure me, nor come to speak of his doubt to me.

When at last he had appeared, having feasted so much upon human blood his skin was warm and his face flushed, it was to creep inside the bedroom he had given me (it was actually his room that he'd put me in, all the others being too large and draughty for his liking) and stroke my cheek gently with almost-warm hands.

I awoke swiftly. Eyes snapping open the moment I'd felt his presence beside me – the dipping of the bed, the utter stillness that could mean only vampire.

"You've been crying," I whispered, reaching out to wipe the tears that still ran from his eyes. I didn't notice their blood-red colour.

He nodded, biting down on his bottom lip before he passed a hand across his face and seemed to wipe all signs of weariness and despair from his features. He tried to smile, hiding the canines as successfully as he could manage in his tormented state.

"You have a... question, my love, do you not? I can feel you burning to ask it?" His voice was surprisingly strong and steady and I can still remember that shock reorganisation that I did indeed need to ask him something.

I frowned at him for a very long time, his hand playing in my hair as he stared back at me. "How- how can – how can you live with yourself?" I asked eventually, weakly, as I voiced the doubts that that had plagued me all night, "How do you manage to kill so thoughtlessly..."

"I kill only those of evil-deeds," he replied almost immediately, his gaze not faltering once, "Like you do now. I learnt a long time ago to shut away the side of me that kills those men. For it's not me that does that, Simon, it's the vampire in me. And that's the way you will learn it too."

The thrill that ran through me when the word vampire tumbled oh-so-casually from his lips!

He tensed again, such intensity returning to his face! "Are you sure this is what you want?"

"And if I said no? What then? Would you be forced to kill me...? Or turn me anyway?" I smiled humourlessly. There had been no going back the minute I'd followed him from the church, and now, with him laid beside me, I was more certain of what I wanted than ever.

He nodded again, hand moving round to cup my cheek as he lifted me off the bed and carried me out to the balcony. There I was stood on my feet though he still held tight to me as though afraid I was going to run.

I admit the thought crossed my mind, briefly enough for me to remember it centuries later.

I felt his chest rise as he took a deep breath and then that same breath tickle my neck as his lips pressed against it. His hands tightened on my shoulders as his teeth scraped my skin.

I gasped.

Then the lips pulled back and a line of worry creased that perfect mask before those lips – they were real! So real! – pressed against mine and hot, thick blood filled my mouth. And then those lips, as soft and as promising as they looked, fell against my neck again.

"To lessen the pain," he murmured. And then his arms were wrapped around my back and I was pressed so close to his chest I could feel his heart beat, could feel the strength in the arms that could crush me as easily as I could crush bread.

I realised in that moment that I trusted this man - vampire. For whatever unknown reason, I trusted Remus. I trusted him to take my life and give me it back, I trusted him to not harm me by mistake.

I trusted him.

And so I showed him in the only way I knew how. I tilted my head, baring my neck to him completely and I relaxed into him, giving him my body to support for I knew my legs would not hold me for long.

And that final moment!

That final moment before the fangs sank in is forever imprinted into my memory – the dark sky streaked with the beginnings of dawn – my new beginnings, as I saw it -, the air filled with the sounds of birds starting their morning songs, the chill of night that still lingered.

And then...

Then the lips pressed once against my pulse in a teasing kiss, and the teeth scraped skin again, sending tremors round my body that made my eyes flutter shut.

Pain!

The shock of the pain as I felt those teeth pierce my neck for the very first time, but by no means the last!

Then waves of pleasure that crashed against me...! Dark, torrid waves that dragged me down into the realms of unconsciousness... a cold hand splayed against my face... a warm body that kept me grounded... my heart flailing against the pull... my will slowly going... vision fading... legs buckling... back arching...

Warm liquid inside my mouth... cold stone against my back... smooth skin beneath my lips and teeth... Tingling in my limbs... Gasping for breath... Then those lips – those lips of an angel – against mine for a second, delicious time and the tang of blood stinging my senses... Feather light kisses against my eyelids...

Teeth piercing my neck... that pull on my heart... my body fighting still – or perhaps my soul?... then an overwhelming need for his blood wracking through my body, making my stomach burn and my hands clutch at him... my face hastily pressed against his neck... my own , inexperienced teeth tearing and blood gushing over me with a quiet desperation... eyes still closed... warm, loving whispers in my ear... his quiet moan as he pulled me away...

The bitterness of the blood as it ran down my throat...

That first taste that sent fire coursing through my body! That first taste that made me weak with desire for it!

All so in pieces! All so mixed! And the most prominent thing I can remember is how good it felt, is how much I wanted him to keep on going and how ashamed of that weakness I was! How trivial it seems now!

How long we exchanged blood for, I do not know. I know only that by the time we'd stopped, the sun was already burning my newborn skin and I was bundled inside his cloak and he ran with me to the darkest dungeon where we lay together for most of the day, my face pressed against his chest to shield my eyes from the little light there was and him recounting stories of his past.

And when I finally opened my new eyes for the very first time, I was a monster.

I was a vampire.

Part VIII: The End

And that is my story. There's more to it of course, there's always more to any story. But that is the beginning, that is how I came to be a... vampire. A blood-sucker. A leech. An immortal. I have nine-hundred years of history behind me; a story that would take forever for me to recount. A story that would bring to me to my knees with the pain it would cause me to remember; with the pain it has caused me. Yes, I am not above emotion as I may seem to you. Truly, I felt once upon a time. Now, after nine hundred years of having my heart repeatedly smashed to pieces, I have perfected the art of concealing all emotion and shutting them off from me.

And yet, you're only question is not how can I bare feeling numb and cold, nor what happened to Richard, or the pain I've endured over these centuries, it's a question of my sanity. A question of how can I honestly think I am a nine-hundred year old vampire? You're completely disregarding any possibility that we actually exist. Truly discarding my tale as mere fantasy from an over-active imagination!

Yet, yet you believe in the Theory of Evolution, and the idea of adaptation. So why, then, has it not occurred to you that there is some human race somewhere that has evolved beyond what any of you imbeciles could ever dream of?! Why has it not occurred to you that humans cannot and will not stay on top of the food-chain forever?!

For even the most fearsome jungle-cat has enemies, my friend.

So yes, I have a history; a past; lives lived that you would not believe. I have loved many a time; I have fallen too often; I've hated too many; wanted too much! But then – then I've known the beauty of pure bliss. I've known happiness so intense it doesn't seem real. I've known the best of people; the worst of people.

I've seen fashions change; lives alter; God lose power. But humans?

They never change.

In truth, I cannot stand... humans anymore. They bore me. They tire me. They have no interest for me. They do nothing new! They keep repeating the same mistakes over and over and over again! I am sick of it. How many times must I see a race wiped out because of prejudice? How many times must I see one man take on the world and fail at the final hurdle?! To quote Richard on religion, "In the ways it makes men act, it bothers me greatly,"

They do not think. They do not consider possibilities. They cannot. You refuse to! I am an example of such a fault. I would not be looking back over dull, grey years with such hatred if I had not made such a rash decision.

And how many of you, after reading this, will carry on in your quest for immortality despite the warnings I've given you, despite the anger and resentment I feel towards it! How many of you fear Death simply because science cannot explain it and so you seek to avoid it whatever the cost?

Perhaps it is envy at the root of my hatred, perhaps it is my over-whelming envy of frail mortal years; of the ignorance and bliss mortality has; of the family ties and love you are capable of feeling. And yet, was it not I that once screamed at Richard that love was a mortals-fool? That love, if it did exist, existed only as yet another evil to corrupt the hearts and minds of men? I do not know. For love, if it does exist, is no trivial thing that only plagues the heart's of men for mine has been broken many a time over the centuries.

And I am no man.

Immortality means more than to live forever. It means more than to never die. For dying would be some relief, dying would mean not having to keep up with the changing world, not having to hate myself every single day and live alone with this dreadful secret of what I really am!

I would welcome Death with open arms and a fresh neck, as Richard once did.

Remus.

Oh, Remus, how I miss him!

When I next see Remus, for Death will claim me eventually, he'll take one look at the... shell I've become and he'll say to me, "What's this mask you hide behind, Sirius?! What's this painted-black mask doing hiding the shine to your eyes, the energy to your heart?! What's darkened the soul I so fell in love with all those years ago?!"

And I'll look back at him, and I'll simply reply, "Take away the mask and I will crumble, I will break down in tears at your feet."

For I need this mask to keep on going, to cope with the burden of immortality I took so lightly. I need this mask, for what sort of vampire would I be, if I curled up as a ball on the floor and cried for the rest of eternity?

I wouldn't even be worthy of the term.

Yes, exceedingly long for a coursework... I know. So, guys, mind answering a few specific questions when (if) you review? It really would be a big help!

1) What do you think of the realtionship between the two?

2) Too sexual; too gay; just right for vampires.

3) Any parts that need taking out? Or anything that needs adding?

4) Any major mistakes?

-grin- I'll love you forever if you help me out here!