Disclaimer: I neither own nor operate "Moonlight." However, I do thank the series writers for creating such a nice playground.
Author's note: This takes place after the last televised episode. What if a cure might be available? These are just my thoughts on the subject.
This is my first foray into "Moonlight" fanfic. Reviews are welcomed, encouraged and appreciated.
Chapter 1-- It's Genetic
"I dated him for about three weeks," Suzanne said. "I told him he didn't want to bite me, but he didn't listen."
Beth and Mick were at a loss for words. Beth's friend Suzanne had just correctly identified Mick as a vampire. When he asked how she knew, she admitted she had dated a vampire: one Josef Kostan.
"So what happened?" Beth was the first to regain her voice.
Suzanne chuckled. "Well, he did it anyway. He went for my wrist. Made him gag. I laughed my butt off."
Mick gave Beth a confused look. "Laughed? At Josef?"
Suzanne nodded. "Yep. See, I'm diabetic. I told him I was, but since I'm well controlled, he wasn't picking up on extra sweet blood. He thought I was just being coy and playing hard to get, so he thought he'd bowl me over with his charm and biting technique." She laughed again. "I maintain my control through diet, exercise and medication. Not insulin, just oral meds, but that was enough. I told him I hoped all the Metformin in his system from my blood would give him the trots for a week for not believing me."
Beth laughed, too. "Then what?"
"He had already swallowed it and really started in on me about lying to him. I calmly pointed out that I'd told him from the get-go that I was diabetic and on oral meds, but that he didn't believe me. He said he just thought I was telling him that because I didn't want to be his freshie and he would rather I told him that outright, rather than lying to him about being diabetic. I replied that no, I'd never wanted to be his freshie, but that I'd told him the truth from the start. He wasn't happy. Not at all."
Mick started snickering. "I'll just bet he wasn't happy. I bit a girl who was taking that stuff before. She told me beforehand, but I thought I was a big, bad vamp and could handle it. Oh, God. It was horrible. Just horrible. The worst. I can't even begin to tell you how awful it was. Who needs a cross to repel a vamp? Just hold up a bottle of Metformin with your name on it."
The girls dissolved into giggles. "That bad, huh?" Beth said, and Mick nodded, twisting his face into an expression of complete revulsion.
"You should have seen the look on Josef's face. Looked like he'd swallowed rotten eggs," Suzanne said. "Served him right. I gave him fair warning."
"So what's your relationship like now?" Beth asked.
Suzanne smiled. "Good, actually. He got over being mad and realized I had been completely honest with him from the beginning. He just didn't want to admit it. I think there was some of that 'big, bad vamp who could handle it' in there too, and his ego was lightly bruised. So, he actually apologized to me and now calls me occasionally to take me to dinner and talk. He says it's nice to be with someone who doesn't care about his money." She shrugged. "Go figure."
Mick laughed again. "Go figure, indeed. But Josef is consistently one thing, and that's unpredictable. So I guess I shouldn't be completely surprised."
"How long have you been turned, anyway, Mick?" Suzanne asked.
Mick sighed. "It's a long story," he said.
"I've got plenty of time, and I'm interested," Suzanne answered. Mick and Beth had come to her apartment so Suzanne, a cosmetologist, could cut and style Beth's hair. The hair styling was done, and the three were sharing a nice evening.
Mick began the story of his relationship with Coraline, how it went very, very bad, how she had the salve that masked vampire traits, how he had been human for a few days, how Lance had taken her.
"Wow," Suzanne said when he finished. "You could write a fabulous book about that. Only you'd have to claim it was fiction because no one would believe you."
"Tell me about it," Beth answered with a half-smile.
Suzanne sat a moment, pondering. "Did you say Coraline told you she had more salve somewhere?"
"That's what she said," Mick answered. "I've looked everywhere I can think of for it, but no luck."
"Have you ever heard of Dr. Kara Mindini?" Suzanne asked Mick.
"Can't say that I have. Who is she?"
"She's a doctor and researcher at UAB. University of Alabama at Birmingham. You know, that's where I'm from. Anyway, one of my closest friends at home is a girl named Kay Belanger. Her husband, Dar Belanger, and I kid you not about this, was a vampire. He was turned in the 1870s in Asia. Anyway, Dr. Mindini has been doing all this research on blood diseases — including vampirism."
Mick's eyes widened. "Did you say her husband was a vampire? Was? As in, he's human now?"
"I said it. And I know it's true. He showed me pictures made of himself during that time. But actually, you've heard of him, I'll bet. Remember that 70s band, Night Stalker? He was the lead singer. The other guys were human. But he was a vamp."
Beth's mouth fell open. "Oh my God! My cousin loved that band! She's about 10 years older than I am. What was that lead singer's name? Something really corny, like Jimmy Darkness or something like that. They were kind of like Alice Cooper. And their singer was a vamp?"
Suzanne nodded. "Yep. No joke. So he heard about the research Dr. Minidini was doing at UAB. She'd already tried some therapy with other vamps, with not much success. But they were willing volunteers. However, about two years ago, this woman — and bet me it was Coraline — came to her with this salve. Said she knew Dr. M. had been doing vamp research and wanted to help the cause."
Mick's eyes were wide. He looked stunned. "So what did Dr. Mindini do?"
"She took the salve and researched it. She is, among other things, a geneticist, and turns out, this salve stuff carries an enzyme that counteracts the vamp enzyme in the blood so the vamp traits are not expressed."
"Being a vamp is genetic?" This was news to both Mick and Beth. They assumed something supernatural was always in play.
"Wild, huh?" Suzanne replied. "What Dr. Mindini found was that, when a human is dying, certain chemical reactions take place in the blood. Within a narrow window, if that person drinks a vamp's blood, an enzyme in the vamp's body causes a chemical change in the human's blood, essentially re-coding the DNA and causing the vamp traits to express themselves."
"A narrow window, huh?" Mick said, thinking. "So that's why it's so dangerous to turn someone." He and Beth looked at each other. "Sarah," they said in unison.
"Right. Exactly. Josef was probably just a few seconds too late. But he knows about Dr. Mindini and suffice it to say, supports her research financially."
"Wow," was all Mick could say for a few minutes. "Wow. So," he asked, "how does the changed DNA account for all the things vamps can do? Isn't there something supernatural going on?"
Suzanne smiled. "You'd think so, wouldn't you? But no. The way Kay said Dr. Mindini explained it to them is that the V-enzyme, which is what she calls it, alters the human instinct, if you will. A human is normally programmed to propagate the species, even at its own expense. The V-enzyme makes self-preservation the priority. So, a vamp becomes the perfect predator."
Mick sighed. "Well, that's the truth, for sure."
"But you can't help it. You've been changed. The V-enzyme changes everything — bones, musculature, everything. Why can a cat leap on top of something three times its own height? That's what it was designed to do. So are vamps. Their changed musculature allows them to do crazy things like leap tall buildings and climb walls. But they can't do anything outside the order of nature. They can't fly or levitate or anything like that. Acute sight, smell, hearing. All signs of a predator. Faster than other humans. It's all part of being a predator."
"Yeah, but vampire speed is pretty fast," Mick said.
"Can you outrun a cheetah?" Suzanne asked.
"Never tried, but probably not," he answered with a grin.
"So how does a simple wild cat run at speeds of 70 miles per hour — the fastest land animal? It's design."
Mick rubbed the back of his head, as he was apt to do when thinking. "Honestly, I never thought of it that way. So how did your friend's husband get turned back into a human?"
"It wasn't easy, according to Kay. Dr. Mindini first gave him the salve to mask the vamp traits. Then she got a pint of blood from him. After that, as I understand it, she prepared some kind of infusion using his original DNA and genetic material from the salve, that eradicated the v-enzyme while not altering the original coding. It took probably, six months. Most of that time, she kept Dar human with the salve and kept getting blood from him. Then, they put him in ICU under heavy sedation, bled him down, put the infusion into one pint of his human blood and administered it. Then, she ran in the rest of his human blood and he's been human for over a year."
"So the salve plus his own blood caused the vamp enzyme to what, retreat?" Mick asked. Could this be the cure he was looking for?
"More like turned it off. Overcame it. Made it go away. It couldn't replicate in Dar's human blood without the death process chemical changes taking place. He's had complete DNA profiling every three months without a trace of the V-enzyme. The process was pretty scary, though, according to Kay and Dar. While he was under and the infusion was changing his DNA, he had horrible hallucinations about some of the things he had done. They nearly lost him two or three times because his heart was under such strain."
Mick chewed his lower lip. "Is Dr. Mindini looking for any more volunteers?"
