Daniel, 17

Osmium is a monster.

I am not a monster.

...Am I?

What have I done? Who am I? I don't even know anymore. I get out from under the covers and stare at myself in a cracked mirror. This is what a monster looks like.

Abe stands up, rubbing her eyes tiredly, and walks up behind me. She puts her head on my shoulder and wraps her arms around me.

"Who am I?" I ask her quietly.

You're Daniel, she signs simply.

"But who is Daniel?"

Whoever you want him to be.

I turn to her and kiss her. Gently this time, the way she deserves. I pull away slowly.

"I'm gonna take a walk," I tell her. "I need to clear my head."

She nods and goes back to bed. I slip my shoes on and head out the door.

Crossing the moat in the darkness, nothing but the moon guiding my way, I assure myself that I'm a better man than Osmium. I didn't lock Abe away in a tower. I love Abe. Osmium doesn't even know Katerina. Osmium is scum.

Someone shouts through the darkness, and I immediately duck into the closest building, fearful of being seen. It's pitch-black. Suddenly, a screen lights up. I'm in a movie theater. On the screen is a shot of me on a bed. Abe is next to me. We're kissing each other gently; I over, and suddenly I'm on top of her. My hand reaches under her shirt. I try to pull her shirt off.

She stops my hand, and shame begins to swirl inside my stomach. On the screen I try to lift her shirt again, more forcefully this time. She stops me. "Let me do this."

Her shirt comes off, then her pants. Her bra and her underwear. My clothes disappear as well.

And then I watch myself rape her.

She shakes her head, begging me to stop, but I ignore her. She turns her head away as I continue to do it; tears drip slowly down her face. She closes her eyes.

Monster.

"Turn it off!" I shout.

Give me another chance.

A thought trickles through my mind as I fall to my knees in disbelief at the monster I've turned into. This is what Osmium will do to Katerina.

Abe and I are vampires. We've seen the ugliness that lies at the heart of the human soul, and it killed us. We are the walking dead. I infected Abe when I forced my way inside of her; I turned her into one of us. I forced her to look at the ugliness, at the hurt inside of me. How do I fix it?

I need to put the hurt inside of someone else. Let the vampiric blood flow out of me and into someone else. It's the only cure.

I have to rape Katerina.

Then she will be the vampire. I'll be human again.

It's the only way.

I am crossing the moat. I am climbing the steps. I am kicking the tower door in.

The hurt tells me to rape her. The vampire inside of me tells me I need to do this.

But Daniel tells me I can't. And at the end of the day, I am not a monster. I am not a vampire. I am not the hurt.

I am Daniel.

And who is Daniel?

Whoever you want him to be.

I want him to be strong. I want him to be kind. I want him to be good.

Osmium is going to hurt Katerina. He might not think he's going to, but he will. I know how easily it can happen.

Who do I listen to? Do I listen to the vampire, and rape Katerina? Or do I listen to Daniel, listen to what Abe is telling me? It's achingly hard to ignore the voice that tells me to rape Katerina, but I do it. I listen to Abe instead.

Because vampires don't exist. I was not bitten. I cannot blame it on the blood that flows through my veins, or the hurt that roars up inside of me.

The hurt does not control me. I control the hurt. I create it when I beat Abe bloody, when I rape her and throw her into glass display cases. I've been creating the hurt from the very beginning.

I'm the one who hurt Abe. Me and only me. No one else. Just Daniel.

And I'll be damned if I'm going to let Osmium do the same to Katerina.

Osmium stands up from where he was sleeping on the floor; he comes to me in alarm, and I know he's going to try to assure me that everything is okay and I need to go back downstairs. But everything is not okay. And he realizes that when he sees the axe in my hand.

"The Prince must slay the Dragon," he murmurs sadly.

"You're done hurting women, you fucker," I spit.

But I am not talking to Osmium. I am talking to myself.

I swing the axe into his head; it caves in immediately. Like kicking a pumpkin. I pull out the axe and strike him again. And again, and again, and again.

"Help me," Katerina whimpers from the bed.

The cannon fired moments ago, but that didn't stop me from mutilating Osmium. Only Katerina's sad little voice could stop me. I'm too late, once again.

She's already a vampire. I can hear it in her voice. The walking dead; she's finally joined the rest of us.

I drop the axe into Osmium's stomach and walk slowly to Katerina's bed. I reach across her body to untie her hands from the bedpost.

I will free her. And then I will ask Abe to forgive me.

Because that is the only way that I will ever be able to forgive myself.

Abe, 16

I hear a crash.

My legs fly up the steps like lightning. I step into the forbidden tower and walk in on a scene of complete disarray.

Osmium lies on the floor, his head caved in and an axe sticking out of his stomach. Daniel is on top of Katerina.

He's raping her, too.

Something shatters in my heart. He promised me. No more hurting. He was going to be Daniel again. We loved each other.

But here he is, the filthy sinner, raping Katerina. Well, he's not going to get away with it this time.

I grab him by the back of his shirt; I spin him around and throw him to the ground. I climb on top of him, pinning him to the floor, and lift the axe from Osmium's stomach. Daniel looks at me with wide eyes, but there is no fear in them. There is only peace. This is justice.

This was always how it was going to end.

"Forgive me," Daniel whispers pleadingly, a single tear escaping his eye and slipping down his face.

I shake my head, tears slipping down my own face. No.

I press the axe into his neck; put all of my weight on it so that it sinks all the way through. There is a dull thud as it hits the ground on the other side of Daniel's neck. I stand up. I kick his head away, and listen to it tumble down the steps.

You're done hurting women, Daniel. No more.

"Abe," Katerina cries.

I approach her bed and hover over her body.

"Abe, he was saving me. He killed Osmium. He was untying me. Daniel saved me."

Aibileen Jude, you are a monster.

I killed Daniel. I didn't kill the monster that raped me. I didn't kill the monster that raped Katerina. I just killed Daniel.

My Daniel.

I want to cry out loud. I want the world to hear my sobs. How comforting that would be. Put all of my pain out into the air so that it didn't have to live inside of me anymore.

"Are you going to untie me? Or are you going to let me die here? I wouldn't blame you if you left me here, Abe. I'm so sorry I said those things to you during training. I misjudged you, okay? I didn't know what it was like to be trapped inside of yourself. But I do now, Abe, and I'm so... I'm so sorry that you have to live this way every day. You don't deserve that. No one does."

I reach up. Slowly, ever so slowly, I untie Katerina from the bedposts. She rubs her wrists. And then she comes at me.

In that split second, I know she's going to kill me. That's what you get for trusting people, Abe. But she hugs me instead. And it feels good. I don't feel so utterly and hopelessly alone anymore.

"Thank you," she says tearfully. Then she wipes her face and returns to her usual demeanor: all business. "I'll leave first. You leave ten minutes after me."

She walks away, but stops at the door, turning back to look at me.

"And, Abe?"

I raise my head to look at her.

"If you ever need me, start a fire. I'll be there. I've got your back."

And then she walks out of my life.

I want to tell her thank you. But that's okay.

I'm used to being a safe harbor for all of the words that go unsaid.

Careers: (Location - Bumper Cars)

Avenaye, 17, District 4

Iskandar, 18, District 1

Alliance One: (Location - Arcade)

Dolly, 16, District 10

Dara, 12, District 10

Alliance Two: (Location - Cafeteria)

Laciel, 18, District 12

Niels, 15, District 8

Alliance Three: (Location - Haunted House)

Bidzill, 17, District 11

Remi, 17, District 3

Desdemona, 13, District 8

Alliance Four: (Location - House of Mirrors)

Alise, 14, District 3

Jango, 17, District 5

Loner: (Location - Unknown)

Katerina, 17, District 2

Loner: (Location - Princess Castle)

Abe, 16, District 7