A/N: Happy October, my loves!

So...NCIS, vampire-style. I know, it's weird. But you clicked, so you must be ready to roll with the crazy.

Though I want this to be a fun, different take on the NCIS characters, I also want to make sure I take it seriously enough that it doesn't get stupid. So, this is not your traditional love story. It's T/Z, yes, but Ziva is a vampire and I want to make sure I do vampires justice after Stephenie Meyer bastardized them in Twilight. I tried not to do that, I tried hard to be true to both vampire lore and NCIS and my unique brand of weirdness, and now the rest is up to you.

In this timeline, Kate just died but no one replaced her and Ziva never joined the team.

My thanks to my lovely beta and friend Mina (Wilhelmina Willoughby) who helped me piece the plot together (and will probably be looking over future chapters for me). She's brilliant and I do not deserve her.

As always, this one's for you guys. My readers. You are all perfect and I love you. Hope I did you proud.

Bloodlust
By: Zayz

I wait my whole life to bite the right one
Then you come along and that freaks me out

For richer or poorer, through sickness and in health
Til death do us part
Til death do us part
You only live once
Well, not in our case
because we live forever.

- Outkast, "Dracula's Wedding"

"DiNozzo! Up!" Gibbs sails through the bull-pen, swatting the back of Tony's head without so much as blinking. "We got work to do."

"Boss?" Tony's head pops up, his hair standing every which way.

He looks terrible. A light layer of fuzz is beginning to crop up on his jaw. There are definite shadows under his eyes, and the lines of his face look deeper somehow. His suit is as rumpled as he is. In the past week, he must have slept under twenty hours. And now it's seven thirty in the morning and here he is, slapped awake.

"DiNozzo, where's McGee?" Gibbs is more agitated than usual this morning, downing what appears to be his second cup of coffee for the morning. Apparently he hasn't slept much either.

"Went to the bathroom, boss."

"Well, we have two more bodies."

"Two more?" Tony is aghast. This is the fifth body in five days. "Same MO?"

Gibbs nods and briefly rubs his face in his hands, betraying his exhaustion and frustration.

"Where were these ones found?"

"Norfolk. Near the ocean."

Tony shakes his head. "And Abby. She hasn't found anything useful?"

"Not yet."

McGee appears, as worn-out as Tony, yawning as he approaches his desk. He sees Gibbs and instantly his back straightens, his eyes large and innocent and fixed on Gibbs.

"Good morning, boss," says McGee, smiling weakly.

"Two more bodies, McGee. DiNozzo, get the keys. We're going to Norfolk."

"On it, boss." Tony scrambles for the keys and his backpack, and the three rush out to the elevator.

It's been two months, but it still doesn't feel right, going to the crime scene in a group of three rather than four. There's still a pang in Tony's chest where Kate used to be – and still somehow lives. He misses her every time they set off into the warm summer mornings, gear in hand, getting stuck in traffic. He and McGee still banter, but it's muted. It's not the same.

The work is enough that they need do another person on the team, but Gibbs hasn't gotten around to hiring one yet, and neither Tony nor McGee dare to ask him to.

They arrive in reasonable time to their crime scene in Norfolk. As ever, Ducky is late, appearing irate as Palmer apologizes over and over for not taking the right exit. Ducky settles in on the ground with the bodies, gently examining them, his keen eye looking for clues.

At last, he says, "I'm sorry to say it, Jethro, but these are as clean as the last victims. Same MO. As you see here, there are two puncture wounds in each of their necks, and they are both drained of their blood. Judging by their palor, I'd say there's little, if any blood, inside their bodies."

"What do you think that means, Duck?" Gibbs's brows are furrowed with frustration.

"I think you're dealing with a serial killer," says Ducky. "And I think you'd better find him fast."

"You think it's a him?"

"Now, this is obviously more your area of expertise than mine, but in my experience, this sort of violence tends to correspond more to males than to females," he says. "This MO is highly unusual. Vampiric – like in the old stories. And vampire lore tends to focus on masculine aggressors and feminine victims. But again, I leave this to your good detective work rather than my speculations."

Smiling slightly, Ducky gestures for Palmer to get the gurney, and get the bodies back to truck. Gibbs sighs wearily, anticipating another long day and a longer night. Tony and McGee canvas the scene, and exchange nervous glances; they too anticipate yet another long day.

"Who do you think this guy is?" McGee asks. "I mean, there's no pattern to the victimology. The only thing we've found so far linking the five previous victims is that they were in quiet, isolated areas and snatched without anyone knowing, and then dumped somewhere near water."

"I don't know who he is," says Tony. There's an edge in his voice that betrays his own frustration. "But we'll figure it out. Soon."

"Yeah," says McGee, because that's what he is supposed to say, even if he doubts it.

Tony knows this. He shoots the probie a Look, and continues searching the surrounding area.

There's something about this case. Something that raises the hairs on the back of his neck. He has seen terrible things on the job, yet there is something about these blood-drained bodies, these random victims, this alarming kill rate, that feels strange. It's a visceral gut reaction that he can't quite put his finger on.

He wants to tell McGee, but he doesn't know which words to use. He can't explain it. And even if he could, he doubts the probie would understand. McGee, whose world is composed of computers and numbers and pixels and logic, wouldn't be able to comprehend the way the human gut just knows things.

For the second time today, Tony misses Kate. Maybe she would have understood. Maybe she would have felt it too. Kate was always more intuitive than McGee.

There's nothing in the surrounding areas. As in the previous cases, the killer didn't leave any good clues behind.

McGee is wrapping up too, unsuccessful. Gibbs isn't pleased. His mouth is tight and his eyes are steely, stormy, and this does not bode well for the next few hours.

At one in the morning, McGee is falling asleep at his desk and decides it's time to go home. Tentatively, he asks permission, and Gibbs just shrugs, which is actually scarier than his temper because it means he, too, has hit a snag he hasn't found a way to unravel.

Abby found no DNA on the bodies. There were some signs of a struggle, but for both victims, they were minor; it didn't take much to subdue them. Considering the victims were a thirty-five-year old marathon runner and a twenty-five-year-old petty officer, this suggests a powerful attacker, but not much more. There were no strange substances in or around the bodies. The blood appears to have been drained from the puncture wounds.

Abby and McGee have gone through their computers and there is nothing of value on them. The victims led fairly ordinary lives. They appear to be victims of opportunity – which of course gets the investigation nowhere. And there will probably be more bodies soon.

Tony's head is fuzzy and aching, but that twisty gut feeling he had at the crime scene persists. His body is screaming at him to go home and sleep while he can, but he finds himself driving away from his street and back to Norfolk, back to the crime scene. He knows he probably won't find anything, but his mind is as restless as his body is tired, and the only cure for that is pushing at this until he feels settled. Whenever "settled" is.

He drives around the area where the bodies were found, and then were the victims were thought to be trekking. There's a forest nearby; apparently, they were hikers. Agents canvassed that area too, but found nothing. He parks the car near the edge of the forest and wanders in.

The trees are tall and coolly intimidating, the branches rustling softly in the light wind. The night isn't cold, but Tony still wishes he'd thought to bring his jacket. He feels vulnerable, unprotected, out in this place. Though he's just a few miles from civilization, he feels isolated, like he's in some displaced wilderness away from humankind. It's probably pretty to walk around here during the day, but it's admittedly creepy at night. He follows the footpath, one step after another, reminding himself to look at the stars when the trees feel daunting.

This is a stupid idea. He should go home, make some hot chocolate, and go to sleep. He's never going to find anything in the dark. His restlessness has faded; he's more fatigued than anything else. So Tony turns around to go back to his car, wondering what the fuck is wrong with him.

But that's when he hears a sound that isn't his moving feet. A crack of a branch, a sudden punch of intuition that tells him he isn't alone. He whirls around, searching for the source of the threat – and there, standing a few yards away, eyes like cold, irreverent gems in the night, is a coyote.

A coyote.

He didn't even know those lived in Virginia.

But this one does. This one is slightly crouched, like it's waiting to attack, its teeth glinting like a row of shiny swords in the moonlight.

Tony has seen a lot and done a lot on the job, but he has never been afraid like he is now, tense and realizing all too potently that his life is in serious danger. He can't stay here, but he can't move; he's paralyzed with terror, and anyway, it would probably piss off the coyote and send it running after him, vicious and hungry and ready to tear the flesh from his bones.

"Nice coyote," he says uncertainly, edging back slightly. "Easy there…let's not make this a Thing, blow it out of proportion…"

The coyote doesn't appear convinced. It takes a defiant step forward.

Fuck.

His chances of escape appear increasingly dim. He has no idea what to do. He keeps edging back, an uneasy smile plastered to his face, his speed increasing. The coyote is in full-on challenge position now, obviously agitated.

Tony keeps stepping back, but fear takes over then and he starts running – and as he suspected, the coyote bolts after him, faster than anything he's ever encountered – and it's getting too close too quickly, even as he runs full out, adrenaline pumping through every cell in his body. He tries his best not to scream, tries to find his car, but the trees are everywhere and he's so afraid that he'll trip over a root or something and get eaten alive, and this was such a bad decision, he has no idea why the fuck he came here tonight—

The coyote bites at his leg. Its teeth sink into his calf, pain explodes on the spot, and he falls. His heart is beating so fast and so hard it's echoing in his ears. All he can think is yup, this is it, this is the end – alone in a forest with a coyote. All he can do is close his eyes and hope his heart will stop quickly enough that he won't feel most of this.

But something happens then. Just as the coyote lunges on top of him, its teeth bared, just as it digs its paws into his flesh, just as it starts biting his chest and the pain is like an all-encompassing hurricane and he's about to black out – something stronger and faster than the animal appears out of nowhere. It pulls the coyote off of him – it howls – but the howls get softer, faded, like it was thrown a great distance.

There's blood everywhere, so much blood. He's woozy, in and out of focus. This is it, this is the end, he's going to die here, even if the coyote is mysteriously gone. His brain is awash with chemicals and fear. He never does get to see his life flash before his eyes, though. He just sees hazy colors and blurs, even as he tries to focus on what exactly is here, saving him.

Right at the end, where his memory blanks, he remembers is a voice, a woman's voice, saying, "Shhhhh…" He remembers bursts of pale brown and red circles and forest green, the blurs of trees. A shadow, heavy and cold, hovering over him, lowering itself into his neck. A new puncture of pain, a white supernova of agony and heat swallowing up his senses—

And then nothing. Just black.

A/N: My Google search informed me that small numbers of coyotes do live in Virginia, though they are more plentiful elsewhere. For the purposes of this story, this is absolute fact and that's all I'll say about it.

So. There's chapter one. There will be five. Are you excited? I'm excited. There's some fun stuff coming up. Hope you guys will stick around for it.

Review box is below, in case you forgot.