Scud watched the vamp leave. Once again he was alone with his thoughts. Thoughts of the mess he had gotten himself into, not that it helped. He was stuck and had been since he was 14 years old.

It was hard to believe he had ended up here, about to die. At best he only had a few days before the suckheads would kill him. Or B would kill him. If he had known that long ago night exactly what was being offered to him by Damaskinos that night he would have turned it down.

No, in all honesty he have still accepted the offer. He was desperate to escape the life he could look forward to on the streets. Scud had been lucky up to that point. So far he had been able to avoid the rougher johns, Al made sure the johns appreciated his 'Pretty little Scud'. But that didn't change what he was, a whore. In time Al would find another pretty little boy and Scud would have been walking the streets selling his ass to anyone with $20 in their pocket. But Al had sold him to Damaskinos before that happened.

With experience comes wisdom they say. He knew now that a life selling his ass on the streets would have been better than where he was now. A vampire familiar being used as a pawn against their greatest enemy, the daywalker, Blade.

He lit a joint drawing the smoke deep into his lungs. He hated remembering because it had all been so good at first. Damaskinos had been kind to him. He had taken him off of the streets that night; fed him, clothed him. Saw to it that Scud went to school and got his diploma. No more sweaty old men groping him. No, his life was almost normal except for the fact that his 'guardian' was a vampire. The day Scud had turned 18 that all changed.

Scud found out exactly why Damaskinos had taken him off of the streets when Reinhardt had delivered him to The Maze. A combination club/brothel that Damaskinos owned. Scud was a whore, just that quick he was back where he had started. The only difference was now Damskinos was pimping him out and the clientele made his previous johns seem like angels in comparison. The only rule of the place was that they couldn't kill the familiars; other than that, the familiars were fair game for anything, no matter how perverted or brutal.

Scud found a way to make life a bit more pleasant completely by accident. When the familiar managing the place managed to crash the computer, Scud had known how to fix it and retrieve the financial data everyone thought was lost. Scud had found himself protected from the most sadistic of the clients. Scud made it a point to upgrade the system, then he added improvements to the security system. Pretty soon Scud was off the menu.

Damaskinos finally saw him as more than a pretty little whore to pull in money with his mouth and ass. Scud's talents were too important to risk one of the clients getting carried away in the heat of the moment. Instead Scud spent his nights chained naked in a cage so all the vamps could ogle him to get in the mood. He still occasionally got groped through the bars but it was way better than the alternative.

Scud you're just too damned smart for your own good. You just had to let them know you had talents they could use. Before he knew what was happening Reinhardt was taking him away again and he had a new job, gaining the trust of the daywalker so the newly formed Bloodpack could get close enough to kill B.

Well getting in good with B, that part at least was enjoyable. B was a good guy. With B, Scud was treated like a person for the first time in God knows how long. All Blade asked him to do was to keep the car running, and keep the security up to date. Other than that Scud was pretty much left to his own devices. Which is why he knew he was probably living on borrowed time. Damaskinos had changed the plan. The Bloodpack had a bigger fish to fry, Jared Nomak.

But Scud's job hadn't changed, only the timing. Now he had to help B and the bloodpack kill Nomak. Before it was all over they would still have B. thanks to Scud. He knew what the Suckheads would do to him if he betrayed them, but if B lived it would be worth it. He was about to betray Damaskinos and the entire Bloodpack to Blade.