Something bumped into her, and Gwen froze instantly. It took her three seconds to realize that it had just been another student hurrying down the hallway that had bumped into her; it took another twelve seconds for her to slow her breathing back to normal.

Last night had been the most horrifying night of Gwen's life, and all day she had been on edge. Her fight or flight instinct had been on overdrive, and more often than not, she felt like going into "fight" mode. It occurred to her that, just maybe, coming to school hadn't been such a good idea today. But at the same time, she really didn't think some guy, some guy whose face looked like an angry bulldog, was worth her attendance record.

Except that she could still feel him.

It took another five seconds to get her breathing down again.

It wasn't the end of the world, Gwen rationalized. There had been guys before Adrian, and there would always be guys after. Her mind wandered Justin, and for the first time all day, a hint of a smile grew on her face. He was really nice, and he seemed to be interested in her. If she hadn't been so focused on Adrian, she would have liked to date him.

Gwen smiled. Yup, Justin was the guy. A confident stride took over Gwen's step, and she was even able to shove the eerie feeling of her connection to Adrian into the back of her mind. Finally Gwen arrived at her locker, and her heart swelled at the sight of a rose taped to the door of her locker, and a post-it that had her name simply scrawled on it. She pulled the rose off, and from the way it looked, Gwen could tell that it had probably been taped on sometime the night before. But a slightly wilted flower was definitely better than nothing.

With a happy sigh, Gwen sniffed the rose while she opened her locker. This definitely had to be Justin's work, right? She put the rose in her pocket and twirled the combination lock, and it popped open. Gwen took off the lock and opened her locker door.

drip.

Gwen's breath caught in her throat.

drip.

A piece of string had been attached to the roof of Gwen's locker, and the other end of the string was tied around a fairly large fishing hook.

drip.

Beneath the string, an index card sat, slowly becoming saturated with a dark burgundy color. In different handwriting than had been on the post-it, a message said "Would he have given you his heart?"

drip.

Jabbed onto the hook, a bloody organ sat suspended in the center of Gwen's locker, slowly dripping blood down into her locker. A human heart.

Gwen didn't scream. She closed her eyes and slammed her locker shut.

Fuck this shit.

***

"Now, envisioning your verdant chakra, inhale deeply. Try to think of the air as a more than just oxygen, but as a life source, the energy that sustains all things..." said Ashley hypnotically, holding a crystal steadily in her outstretched palm.

Rhett took in a deep breath. And sneezed.

Ashley frowned. "Really, Rhett?"

Rhett looked indignantly at the Watcher.

"Well, excuse me.

Do you ever dust this place?"

"That's really not the point," said Ashley. "You should be able to control yourself enough to avoid breaking the meditation. And we already covered the physical chakra anyways - your physical needs should not be interrupting at this point. Have you been listening to any of my instructions?"

"What does chakra have to do with a freakin' sneeze?" complained Rhett. "I still think this is really - "

The door slammed open, and instinctively Rhett stood up, positioned to fight even before the door hit the wall. His posture instantly relaxed as he saw Gwen walk in.

"Gwen? What are you -?"

Gwen stormed up to Rhett, her eyes blazing with fury.

"What the hell is going on?"

Rhett stammered, trying to find an answer, but he was too taken aback to say anything.

"First! First I go on a stupid date and you interrupt it. What the fuck is that, hitting on my boyfriend? Are you gay or something? And then you start fighting him and then he leaves and now I've been freaking out all day to find THIS!" she ranted, her voice getting louder and louder with every syllable.

"Calm down," said Rhett, trying to ease her into sitting at a desk. Gwen didn't budge. "What did you find?"

"A heart! A fucking human heart in my locker! What the fuck is going on?"

Rhett shot a look at Ashley, but she was already at her desk, calling in the police to inform them of Gwen's little surprise.

"Do you know whose heart it was?" asked Carlos, setting down his book and walked over.

Gwen whipped around furiously. "YOU!" she screamed, lunging at Carlos. She delivered a sharp kick to Carlos' shin that sat him back down in his desk. "This is all your fault!"

Ignoring the pain in his shin, Carlos glared apprehensively at the small girl. "My fault? How is this my fault? I didn't know you were jonesing for a total psycho!"

"Your spell probably caused it!" yelled Gwen, kicking his shin again.

"Spell?" asked Rhett, raising his eyebrow.

"It wasn't a big deal! She just paid me to perform a love spell on her!" exclaimed Carlos, holding his shin.

"It made him insane! He ripped out Justin's heart!"

"What were you thinking, Carlos?" asked Rhett, stepping in between Gwen and Carlos before she could draw blood. "A love spell to make a vampire stalk her? Smooth move."

"I didn't know!" protested Carlos. "She's the one who should know about her secret love being a blood-sucking fiend!"

"What the fuck? Vampire?"

***

Gwen gently closed the door behind her, careful not to wake her parents. They were stressed enough after today's events - nowhere near as shaken as Gwen was, but whatever. Old people needed their sleep.

She stepped out onto the porch, instantly wishing she had put on a jacket before she'd left. Winter was moving in, and it was getting way too cold to wear short sleeves anymore. But what had she worn? Short sleeves, of course.

Nonetheless, the crisp autumn air felt good on her skin, filled her with refreshing clarity as she inhaled the cold air. And she definitely needed clarity at this point - as if the whole heart ordeal wasn't bad enough in itself, she'd been pulled out of school and questioned by the police for hours concerning her relationship with Justin, how she'd found the heart, and they'd even thrown in an extra hour for Gwen to speak to a psychologist about "how she felt" about finding Justin's heart in her locker.

How the fuck did they think she felt? She still didn't know what to make of Rhett and Carlos either. They were strange kids, and she hadn't known that they knew each other - it made everything seem so much more suspicious, especially their claims that vampires were real. She just didn't know what to believe.

Shaking her head to clear it of all the cluttered thoughts, Gwen walked off into the night, taking in more of the cold air and welcoming the clarity that followed.

"Did you get my gift, baby?"

Gwen stopped, trying not to let the fear freeze her veins.

"What do you want from me?" she hissed.

Adrian stepped out from the shadows and took Gwen's hand. "I want you, Gwen. Forever. Isn't that what love is?"

Gwen glared daggers at his hand as he touched her. "Love sure as hell isn't ripping out people's hearts. At least not in the realm of the sane."

Adrian smiled deviously. "Love makes us all crazy, babe."

"God, and people wonder why I don't date," groaned Rhett, appearing out of nowhere and yanking Adrian's hand away from Gwen. Adrian just smiled.

"Somehow I imagined you'd be here," he said. "You're always in the way. And you know I won't let anyone stand between me and my love for Gwen."

"Get me out of the way, then," challenged Rhett, holding his arms out. "Let's see what you've got."

Adrian laughed and lunged at the Slayer, tackling the boy to the ground. Rhett grunted as he was slammed into the ground, but he quickly kicked Adrian off of him.

"Not good enough," said Rhett, standing up. A blow from behind almost knocked Rhett face-forward, but he managed to maintain balance.

"Mm, did I not mention that I brought my friends?" asked Adrian.

Rhett looked around nervously. Surrounding Gwen, Rhett, and Adrian were about twelve vampires, all vaguely familiar beneath their contorted facial features.

"What the hell is this? Is the entire JV soccer team vamped?" asked Rhett, "Great. There's not gonna be a single player on varsity next year. Way to show team spirit."

"You can't face us all, Slayer," mocked Adrian, advancing on the boy.

"Funny thing," announced a voice from behind Adrian. Adrian turned around, only to see one of his comrades burst into flames. Carlos stepped through the ashes, standing where the vampire once had.

"He doesn't have to," came another voice. Adrian turned to face it, seeing a young woman with long black hair standing behind one of his vampire comrades, holding both of the vamp's arms behind his back painfully.

"Um, excuse me?" said Rhett, causing Adrian to turn back to him. Rhett held out his stake, a taunting smile on his face.

"Now may I have this dance?"

***

"Haha! Dude, that was so intense!" laughed Rhett, walking down the hallways of Sandia High School. "The looks on their faces! They so knew that they were screwed! That was so much fun."

"Yeah, maybe for you," groaned Carlos, walking next to Rhett. "You heal like Wolverine or something." Carlos gently touched his black eye and winced, then winced from the pain that wincing had caused in his sore muscles.

Rhett shrugged. "I'm sure I've got a bruise somewhere."

"Whatever. I hate you," sighed Carlos, opening the door to Ashley's classroom.

"Hey, if it isn't the Watcher! Did you enjoy watching the fight last night?" asked Rhett jokingly as he sat down.

Ashley sniffed. "I am not imbued with the ancestral strength to fight the forces of darkness," she answered. "I make no apologies."

Carlos became quiet and sat close to the bookshelf, distancing himself from Ashley's desk. Rhett shot him a questioning look, but Carlos had already pulled out a book and begun reading.

The door creaked open, and Ashley quickly scrambled to hide the broadsword she's been getting out back underneath her desk, and Carlos quickly closed the book he was reading and leaned over the cover.

"So this is like the headquarters?" asked Gwen, walking in and closing the door behind her. Ashley sighed in relief and stopped her failed attempt to hide the metallic weapon.

"Gwen? What are you doing here now? Did you seduce another vampire?" asked Rhett.

Gwen shook her head. "Nah."

All three faces looked at her questioningly.

"Well, I just came to train or whatever it is that you guys do in here. You know, curb the forces of evil!" she said, thrusting her fist into the air.

Silence.

"Um, well, not that I'm sure you couldn't do it, but," began Rhett.

"What?" demanded Gwen.

"Well, it's just that you're not really a Slayer or a witch or anything, so there's not much you can do here," explained Rhett nervously.

"Oh, what-ever," said Gwen, rolling her eyes. "There's plenty I can do. I can swing a sword. I can jab some wood into a vamp. Do you honestly think that after finding out that all the horror movies specials are real, I'm gonna just go home every night and watch tv? Hell no. I'm gonna fight evil, and whether you train me or I go out by myself and die because you wouldn't help me, I'm going to do it. Got it?"

Rhett gulped. Carlos coughed and resumed reading his book. Ashley sighed.

"Well, I guess we better get you enrolled in Nordic History."

***