Ethan took a deep breath of air, relishing the cold, forest scent. He had managed to escape through the window just before Benny had entered the classroom. His friend's panic had been obvious but for some reason Ethan just couldn't bring himself to confront him. There was too much going on in his mind.

He knew he was turning into a vampire. Any questions about that disappeared as soon as he stepped into the forest. Not only was his hearing sharper, but there was a certain tingling in his veins that made him restless, similar to adrenaline. This was only confirmed when he spotted his reflection in a pond. It flickered in and out like static.

His thoughts were going through a similar process, switching from one topic to the next. Focusing was becoming increasingly difficult, to the point where he wasn't quite sure how long he had been walking. It had only felt like a few minutes, but a quick glance at the sky showed the sun being swallowed by icy mountain peaks. Which meant it was sunset. Or sunrise? He wasn't quite sure. Either way, the normal cold didn't seem to quite reach him.

The patch of skin where Jesse had injected something in to him had begun to throb intensely. Yet another reason that he was having trouble staying focused.

He had once read something during one of his online browsing sessions about disassociation. A sort of mental detachment where you lose time and your grasp on reality. This seemed to apply to his current situation rather well.

His thoughts quickly turned to a more pressing matter: his friends. What would Sarah say? And Benny? Rory's reaction would just be weird, most likely a quick 'awesome' or 'welcome to Team V'. At the moment though he wasn't feeling like much of a vampire. Was his head supposed to hurt this much?

Groaning he placed a hand to his forehead to attempt and stop the migraine. It didn't help.

"Are you okay?" a small voice asked. He turned around uneasily, clenching his teeth at the way everything blurred around him, before his eyes managed to focus on a small girl, no older than seven. Through his rather broken vision was able to make out light blonde hair and wide eyes.

"I, um," he tried to speak, only to find the words die on his lips. His throat burned with impatience. The skin of her neck seemed to have a firm grasp on his attention. It didn't take a lot of thinking on his part to realize what this meant.

A heart beat reached his ears, steady and full of life, and the world lurched in front of him. He stumbled, catching himself from falling just before the girl. She took a step back. Wrenching his eyes from her neck he directed his gaze upwards, only for it to land on concerned blue eyes.

"Do you want me to get somebody?" she said delicately. He caught the slight quiver in her voice and he blanched. Her heart beat was quickening. She must've been able to sense that something was wrong and he silently begged that she just run away so he could suffer in piece.

A new ache settled just below his gums. Fangs. He licked his lips unconsciously as a new smell reached him. One that made the forests refreshing scent smell like garbage. The fog from before had settled back over his thoughts, tinting them a feral scarlet.

Without thinking he leaned forward and reached out, desperate for the tantalizing smell that drove his mind in to a haze. Somehow he knew that all his problems would be solved if he could just find the source. The girl let out a short squeak as he grabbed onto her only to quickly fall silent. His dry lips met her skin and he immediately bit down.

The flavors that leapt onto his tongue could only be compared to ambrosia. A liquid so unbelievably divine he couldn't help but latch on harder. He needed this. There was nothing more important. Every single drop sent his mind into a fit of ecstasy, driving away the pain that had plagued him for so long.

The moments following came in small, muddled bits.

Somehow he had managed to break away from his drunken high only to find himself staring into the eyes of a very lifeless little girl. The weight of what he had done crashed down on him in waves and he stumbled back into the forest.

He was running, faster and faster, tripping and falling only to get back up and continue sprinting forwards. He may have sprained his ankle along the way, but it had completely healed by the time he was back on his feet.

Eventually he found himself leaning against the rough bark of a tree. His mind still latched on to the frozen expression of the girl. It was only when the sirens screamed in the distance that he began to cry.

He had never been the most masculine of guys. In fact he was far from it—something he had been teased about relentlessly for many years now—but he had always managed to keep a firm grip on his thoughts and emotions. Even when the world seemed to turn against him, he kept a steady mind. He supposed it had something to do with the fact that he was a Seer. A strong mind and quick wit, or whatever else Benny's grandmother had mentioned. Perhaps that was the reason it all came out in that moment. As far as he knew, he was no longer a seer.

He sobbed. Not just a few simple tears, but full out wailing and sniffling, salt water staining his shirt and mixing with blood. The vile liquid was now splattered across his torso and chest, faithful reminders of the horrific act he had just committed. This only managed to make the tears fall faster.

Ethan finally understood just what Jesse had done. He knew how much Ethan cared about others, how he prided himself on protecting people and saving them from harm. Jesse saw the way Ethan hated seeing others in pain, and he used it against him.

The bark dug into his back painfully as he sunk to the ground in defeat. What could he possibly do now? He wasn't going home. There was no way he could ever forgive himself if he hurt Jane or his parents. He was barely hanging on as it was.

There was something wrong about all of this. Something to do with the constant throbbing beneath the skin of his wrist. The fog that covered his mind had cleared slightly, but for how long? His mind was normally organized and neat, but now he found himself grasping at random thoughts he barely understood.

For once in his life, Ethan had no idea what to do, and it terrified him.

"Benny, if you're going to turn on the music at least change it to something decent." Sarah whined. They had spent the past three hours searching the streets of Whitechapel and they were both getting agitated. The tension in the car was like thick soup, and Benny's obnoxious techno music did nothing to ease it.

"But I'm so bored." He groaned, switching off the radio, "Why can't I just do some sort of locating spell to try and find him?"

"You heard what your grandma said. We would need his DNA for that; saliva or a skin sample." She shuddered.

"Dumb spells." He grumbled, before lapsing back into silence. Sarah glanced to the side every so often in search of familiar brown hair, only to see the same endless sea of green and gray.

It scared her, to know that a poison like that could exist. The fact that she could lose part of herself simply by being in close proximity to it was terrifying. And that was just a single drop. She didn't dare think about what might happen to a vampire with a full syringe-worth of that pumping through them.

Thankfully Benny seemed to sense her unease and broke the silence. It seemed he had been dealing with a similar train of thought. "Hey, I was thinking. If the Carnivalus—'

"Caravelus." She corrected.

He shot her a scowl, "Whatever. If the Caravelus wasn't injected into Jesse, maybe it was injected into Ethan."

Sarah frowned. The tone of his voice was a bit too thoughtful and morose, "It only works on vampires, remember? And I'm pretty sure Ethan is not a vampire."

He shifted in his seat as if mulling over something in his mind, "I guess you're right."

She glanced over at him, "What is it?"

"Nothing. Nothing. I was just thinking."

Sarah bit back a sharp retort, "About what?"

"Well, I know Ethan's not a vampire but," his tone had grown calculative and stern, "What if Jesse bit Ethan, turned him into a vampire, and then injected him with the cara- whatever?"

Sarah went silent for a moment as a stone nestled in her chest.

"Benny." Her voice was soft.

"Yeah?"

"We need to find Ethan."

Ethan was panicking. He had pulled out his phone to call Sarah only to be overwhelmed by guilt. He couldn't face her. That little girl was dead. She had a family, a life, and he had ripped it away from her. He had killed her. Vampire or not, it was still murder.

It was stupid. He was smart enough to know that those thoughts hadn't really been his, that he would never intentionally hurt someone, let alone drain their life, but the more rational part of his brain was currently down and in desperate need of repair. The longer he sat there, the longer it seemed he was running on pure impulse and adrenaline.

It only occurred to him after he heard a sickening crack that he had launched his phone at the tree across from him. It now lay on the ground in a heap of broken glass and plastic.

"Seems that the Caravelus is working rather nicely." Jesse's smug voice echoed from behind a tree. He stepped out of the shadows to reveal a satisfied grin, putting his teeth and fangs on display, "How do you feel? Terrible, I'd assume. You must really hate yourself, after what you did to that poor little girl. " Ethan clenched his fists, not even wincing as he felt his nails pierce the palm of his hand. He deserved it.

"Her name was Emily, in case you were curious. Rather dull name if you ask me. Dreadfully common. You'd think this generation would've come up with more creative names by this point." He leered, eyes sweeping over Ethan's broken form. Bile began to claw its way up his throat as he spotted the vampire's all too complacent expression. "Right now the Caravelus is working its way through your system, eating away at your thoughts. It won't be much longer before you begin to lose control. I can't wait to see that. I'm sure Sarah would love to watch as you slowly go insane." Cold eyes lifted to meet Ethan's, "I know I would."

"What the hell is Caravelus?" he growled, ignoring the blood leaking from his clamped fists. Jesse was obviously trying to bait a reaction out of him. "Why are you still here?

"Still annoying I see. I guess there's no harm in telling you though. Caravelus is basically an illegal poison. One that has some rather… destructive effects on a vampire's psyche." His grin widened as he plaintively stared at the blood seeping through Ethan's t-shirt. "To answer your other question, I won't be here for much longer. I just wanted to make sure the poison succeeded before I left. It would be a shame if my attempts to ruin your life were all for naught, don't you agree?"

Ethan surprised himself as he growled. There was anger and then there was pure, undiluted rage, both of which seemed to have taken over. He really was losing control.

Fighting himself he managed to snarl, "What is the cure?"

Jesse laughed. "And why would I tell you that?" he answered slyly.

Ethan bit back another growl. He opened his mouth only to pull it back shut. Whatever poison Jesse had infected him with wasn't deadly. Perhaps he could restrain it.

Jesse seemed to take his silence as a sign of defeat, "Just as I thought. There's nothing you can do. After a few hours you'll be little more than a wild animal. You'll kill anybody you lay eyes on. Who knows, maybe you'll even murder that little brat of a sister? Or perhaps I could speed up the process for you and just—" his speech was cut short as Ethan found himself pushing the elder vampire up against a tree with strength that at any other time would've filled him with immense satisfaction. Jesse could torture him, kill him if he wanted to, but his family was off limits.

The man—teenager vampire monster—barked out a laugh as he stared back at Ethan with ice cold eyes. Somehow he had managed to snap off a tree branch, sharp from the force used to snap it in two, which was now pressed firmly against Jesse's chest, ready to pierce through flesh at any moment.

"What is the cure." Ethan seethed. Part of him was still trying desperately to reign in control, but it was quickly being burned away by the heat of his anger.

Jesse stared back at him for a few moments before bursting into a fit of dark laughter, the smooth grin never falling from his face, "There is none. Why do you think they banned it in the first place?" Their eyes met and Ethan could do nothing but accept the truth in his gaze, "Don't you see Ethan, there is nothing you can do. I always get what I want." He leaned in close, "And I want you to suffer."

Ethan didn't hesitate before plunging the makeshift stake forward. The sound of skin breaking was blotted out by the roar that echoed through his mind. The cracks that had begun to form were beginning to grow, and a strangled cry left his mouth that sounded more animal than human. Every part of him wanted to believe Jesse had been lying, but the satisfaction he had seen in the vampire's gaze destroyed that notion instantly.

Even if Jesse was truly dead—he killed him oh my god what had he done—the vampire had left his mark on the world. Part of Ethan wondered if Jesse had planned for this to happen. He decided it was better not to dwell on that.

It didn't occur to him that he was now sitting down, nor did it occur to him that the tree branch was still clutched firmly in his hands, splinters piercing his palm like tiny daggers. In fact, it was quite possible he had forgotten where he was altogether. The only thing he could see in that moment were two faces. The sad, lifeless eyes of a young girl who just wanted to help, and the triumphant gaze of someone who knew they had finally won.