I do not own Danny Phantom.
Hormones
Alter
Hunger Ascendant
It was the smell. It was always the smell.
He'd read somewhere that smell was the one sense most deeply entwined with the mind, that smell could bring back both the most wonderful and most horrible memories.
Sweat, breath, bodies, blood.
Always blood.
Funny how people never thought of the smell of blood when they think of a high school, but that's understandable. Not everyone could smell like he could. Hell, no one came even close. At least, no one he knew of.
He ran his tongue over his teeth again. His eyes swept across the hall again. He was looking for a drink. Again.
Just so easy to fall into the rhythm. Look around. Find someone he hadn't been with in a while. An easy smile, a teasing smirk, a fleeting touch. He walked away and sure enough, light footsteps followed him.
He grinned. It was good to be the king.
He never knew things could spiral so quickly out of control.
Even with all the warnings, the explanations, the warnings, the help and even more warnings. It was just too easy to give in. He had felt thirsty before, everyone had.
This wasn't thirst.
Thirst didn't gnaw at you, didn't make you jittery and lazy at the same time, didn't make everything seem brighter and duller.
Thirst didn't make you drool when you smelt the crowded hallways of a school, didn't make you run your tongue over suddenly sharp teeth over and over, didn't make you stare at girls who suddenly smelt so good.
This wasn't thirst.
He sank his teeth into her pretty little neck and drank deep, too deep, much too deep.
He drank and drank and drank and swelled, tearing at the seams of his old self. Something had changed, he had changed. Something in him had shifted or twisted or grew or withered.
This was no thirst. This was a hunger, deep and burning and raging and borderline orgasmic to sate.
He laughed through a mouthful of rubies even as the lithe form in his arms grew still.
He retched. He briefly opened his eyes and wretched again.
Too much blood. It seemed an impossible amount. It came through his throat, dripped through fingers desperate to stop the flood, but left a stained expanse that seemed larger than the ocean.
Even as he vomited up his ill gotten meal all over the fragile corpse of the girl he had murdered, the hunger roared. Something in him rebelled at the sight of so much blood. Not the fact that it was there at all, but rather the fact that it wasn't in him. A larger part of him cried out in revulsion.
He grabbed at his hair, nails digging into his scalp, shivering in pure, unbridled need. This was wrong, this was monstrous.
This wasn't human.
He opened his eyes and saw his tongue lapping up blood from her collar.
Something, somewhere had defiantly, maliciously refused to be denied.
It was a terrible thing and it would have been much worse. Had it not been for that red-eyed bastard.
He had looked up, shivering not in need now, but in utter loathing. He had expected to see nothing more than darkness. Clouds blocking out the sky and stars and the moon. Instead he'd seen two red eyes looking back over a hooked beak.
The vulture had screeched, a sound no ordinary bird could even comprehend. And he had fallen forward, still as a statue, over the broken body of his first feeding.
The bastard had made everything seem so logical.
He needed blood. Thus he had to drink blood. Thus he needed to acquire blood.
To acquire blood, he needed to drink from someone. When he had asked why, a bag smacked him in the face. One filled with red. He had sunk his teeth into the bag and promptly vomited.
That was nothing like what he felt last night. Nothing even close. It was every bad taste he had ever tasted, every rotting piece of fruit, every maggot-ridden piece of roadkill, the smell of death on his grandfather's breath in the hospice, the taste of bitter tears at his mother's funeral, the stench of booze in the house after.
Fresh was apparently the only way he'd survive.
Wonderful.
So that meant he had to ensure he had a fresh supply on hand because even though "I owe your mother a great deal, I'm not going to coddle you Daniel. You'll have to learn."
He was so going to kill his god-father for this.
"Look for the ones who prefer solitude. Look for books, fantasy, romance, anything to do with escapism. Look for dark clothing. I believe you call them 'gothic', although I highly doubt you children even know what it means anymore."
He was a smug asshole, but he was also right.
Always wore purple or black. Ate alone, reading a book. Quiet. Withdrawn.
Perfect.
"You've found someone, Daniel?"
"I think so."
"Good. You'll have to feed soon. Before the end of the next week, if I don't miss my guess. Hmmmm. I assume you've not thought about how to approach her?"
"Not yet. She's alone. Apart, if I can put it like that. Always sitting to the si-"
"The word, Daniel, is aloof. And that is a good sign. Solitude makes them more susceptible. You have a book-report coming up soon, yes? I'll… convince your teacher to assign you two as partners..."
"So… vampires?"
In hindsight, that was perhaps the worst possible opening statement ever.
Her head jerked up, her eyes narrowed to slits. Her hand protectively went over to her book, obscuring the title.
"Yes. Vampires. Werewolves. Ghosts. Ghouls. Goblins. Things that go bump in the night. You have a problem with that?"
He lifted his hands up, palms out. "No. not at all. Just interesting, is all. Not seen many girls reading about something so… bloody."
She watched him for a few seconds, snorted and crossed her arms. She leant backwards in the library seat. "Liar. Or very unobservant. Every second bubble-brain in this school is reading one."
"Not like that one." Lovey-dovey, sugary books, yes. Characters having more in line with supermodels than undead blood-drinking monsters. Just a perfect boyfriend with a weird diet plan.
That book was most assuredly not one of those. He had actually read it a week before. Suddenly having a lot of questions while losing most need for sleep led to some pretty long nights reading. This particular author thought more in the lines of Orloc than Lestrat. A rather refreshing change in pace, if he had to be honest.
She frowned, mulling over his words. "You've read it then?"
A nod.
"Why?"
"I'm a vampire."
She had a cute laugh. "You're not in the drama club, are you? You really should consider it. I almost thought you actually believed that."
Pretty smile too.
"What if I told you that I do believe it?"
She opened her mouth, then closed it. Lent back in her chair, made it rock on its back legs. She pursed her mouth and frowned. She let the chair fall forward and looked at him. She was suddenly quite serious. "I'd ask you to prove it."
"Okay. Let me summarize. You have a shadow. You're not hurt by water, crosses, other religious symbols, garlic, salt or purifying herbs. You have a pulse. You show up in a mirror and on camera. You haven't died. You don't have any powers. Your sire suddenly won't answer your calls. You teeth are only slightly longer than the norm. In fact, I think my mom's is longer."
Danny nodded. That was about the gist of it, although she'd left one quite a number of things for brevity's sake. If he didn't know better, he wouldn't have believed himself. But he'd never be able to forget that first feeding.
"On the other hand, you don't seem to sleep or get tired, I haven't ever seen you eat or drink and to top it all of…"
She suddenly whipped her arm forward. Danny yelped and leapt backwards, almost falling of his chair. He glared at the needle in her hand.
"You bleed?" Her eyes suddenly went wide. The needle was clean. She blinked and, very deliberately lent forward and stabbed him with the needle again.
"Huh. That was unexpected."
Danny could only watch as she slumped forward and hit her head on the edge of the table as she fainted.
"You know, I would call that a stupid plan, but it worked. God only knows how or why, though. Still… I suppose I must congratulate you, Daniel."
"Yeah, I'm not too sure how that happened myself."
AN: So yeah… got a bit of time to write, so here you go. Still, it was kinda rushed, so the quality may not be up to standard. I apologize if that is the case.
Yes, it's (more than a) bit cliché, but I've been playing Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines a lot recently, so yeah… vampire!Danny Phantom AU.
But not just vampires. All manner of nasty stuff is real in this world. Also, AU overhaul of just about everything. Because I can.
And yes, the first part was a 'flash-forward' (or whatever you call a glimpse into the future).
Anyway, gonna try and keep this AN short, so let me just say that if this receives a lot of positive comments, I will seriously considering continuing this. Twas fun, and I would have made it longer… but that would have meant more words to check and edit and so on.
And no, this is not my return to writing just yet. I am going to kill the previous AN-chapter though, just to keep things clean.
PS – Poll results so far:
1 - Ember
2 - Desiree
3 - Jazz
4 - Sam
5 - Valerie, Paulina, Dani, Kitty
6 - Spectra
7 - Maddy
8 - Star
9 - Dora, Lydia,
10 - Pandora
~GrinGrin
Written: 02/05/2014
Posted: 02/05/2014