"I hope you at least know the basics of being a vampire. Judging from what you've explained, you're barely scratching the surface of the power you have. The thirst is only going to get worse, but your abilities have a long way to go. How have your parents not taught you more?"
Sora stood staring at the ground, arms crossed over his chest as he hesitated. He knew he hadn't learned near enough from his parents, just the basics to survive. They had never taught him how to catch his own prey and fulfill his thirst. They simply provided for him. All in all, he felt like they had raised him in a human sense.
"They had other...things to worry about," he said, refusing to elaborate. They should know the basis of why he was at the Academy.
What about your concept of feeding? Did they at least tell you animal blood is not substantial?"
"Yes. It only keeps us sated for a short amount of time."
"The more animal blood consumed, the more likely a vampire is to go into a feeding frenzy, due to feeling starved. This is why we have a system to supply desperate vampires with a way to feed without disrupting the precariously balanced peace further than it already is."
Vincent stood from his desk, reaching inside of a glass tank that had been next to the window behind him. Pulling out a dark gray rat, he placed the animal on a desk and motioned for Sora to sit.
"We'll start with your power of persuasion. Vampires can successfully put their prey or target into a thrall in one of two ways. Catch their attention, make them look you in the eye, will them to be your puppet. The other is touch. The more physical contact you have, the stronger your thrall will be." As he placed the rat on one of the desks, he gave the brunette his assignment and seated himself back at his desk.
The rat continued to clean itself thoroughly on the desk as Sora stared at it. Irritation had been clawing at him for the last ten minutes. This rat, with its rough gray fur and beady eyes, refused to look at him. But Vincent had forbid touching it. A skilled vampire would be able to catch the attention of his subject without force. But how was he supposed to do that with an animal who acted nothing like a person? He didn't get it and he felt he never would.
"Elder Vincent, there's no possible way I'm going to get this thing to look at me..." he muttered in defeat, letting his head collapse on his desk. He heard the click of his mentor's tongue, even felt his eyes boring into the back of his head.
"So you are telling me, without properly trying, that you have no understanding of basic interaction without being able to touch something." It wasn't a question. But he had a point. He rarely touched anyone as it was, if he could help it. So why did he think he had to now?
Now I feel like an idiot...
With a wave of a finger, he saw the rat's ear twitch before it turned its head toward him, the black beady eyes looking expectantly from his finger to his eyes. Sora felt the connection snap together when he willed it, imagining the rat scampering across the desktop and leaping at the wall. It did so, pushing off with all four feet and twisting in the air before landing.
However, when he saw the rat come to a halt and began scratching his ear furiously, he furrowed his brows. He wasn't making it do that. But he couldn't stop looking as blood began to sprout from the claw marks, staining the gray fur with deep rich blood. The rat persisted despite the squeaks coming from it's mouth, as if it just couldn't reach the itch it was searching for. When the ear went flying from the scalp of the rat, Sora stood instantly, his chair falling back with a resounding crack! against the floor. He heard his ragged breathing above the squealing, the cold sweat on his skin and the fear gripping the back of his neck.
"Having someone do parlor tricks is all nice and fun," came Vincent's quiet cold voice, "but it won't save your life if someone is trying to hurt you, let alone kill you. We are not here to train you to be killers, but we will make sure you can defend yourself. Start thinking like it."
As he watched the rat slowly give up, the begging squeaks coming to an end as it laid down in a pool of its own blood, Sora felt a slight tug of the darkness haunting his mind. The same feeling he usually felt when he started hallucinating. He rubbed at his face forcefully, willing it away. This was not the time to be having an episode.
Move!
The brunette shifted his feet, one behind the other, and spun to his right as something whistled past his ear and embedded itself into the wall. A paperclip. His eyes found Vincent wit his arm outstretched, crimson eyes staring into his blue ones. Was this guy trying to kill him now? He noticed Vincent's hand move - barely - and went to move his feet again. But he couldn't. His heart picked up a frantic pace when he realized he couldn't look away from those half lidded eyes.
Another paperclip flew at him and he felt it graze his cheek before hitting the wall behind him again. Feeling the warm trickle of blood made something snap in him, something uncomfortable, foreign and cold. He felt his limbs shed the lethargic weight he was trapped in, his feet pushing him from the floor as he leapt and landed on top of one of the desks in the room. Whatever had happened, he was grateful for it. He had broken his mentor's thrall. Sora noted the flicker of surprise on his mentor's face, making a small smirk appear on his own. He had caught him off guard.
This only spurred the older vampire into action, his reflexes a blur as he began throwing projectiles at the boy. Sora began dodging them, almost as if practicing a dance. He felt tiny pricks on his skin when he wasn't fast enough; his moves were being predicted. When this happened, he switched direction. After nearly thirty minutes of dodging, he began to wonder if his mentor was ever going to run out of paperclips.
Or maybe he won't be satisfied until I leave here bloody or nearly dead... he thought.
Then end it. Make him stop. Sora felt his heart constrict at the familiar voice. He's mocking you. Making you his toy. He isn't teaching you at all. End the charade!
He felt his feet spring into action. He didn't want to, and with each passing second, he wasn't sure if it was himself moving. The room blurred as he neared Vincent, watching as his mentor turned to keep his eyes on the movement. At the last second, Sora switched his direction and appeared in front of Vincent. A surge of excitement surged through his chest as his fangs descended and an image of tearing out the man's throat flashed into his mind.
"You're mine!" he shouted in an unfamiliar voice. He watched as Vincent moved, his face set grimly, and then his vision went black.
Sora groaned in displeasure at the pain pulsing in his head as he woke, turning onto his side and burying his face into the pillow. It was quiet, the air smelled of clean linens and medical equipment. The infirmary. He didn't remember how he had gotten there, but he didn't really want to think about it anyway. The pain was enough. All he had to do was go back to sleep and hope he woke up feeling refreshed and pain free.
"Sora!" The brunette groaned again as he heard the voice of Roxas. He was starting to hear the small differences in their voice, thanks to how much Roxas actually talked compared to his brother. "What the hell happened?"
"Leave me alone," he murmured into his pillow, muffling the words. He knew the blonde wouldn't leave, but that didn't mean he had to indulge his curiosity.
"Seriously, what happened to you?" Ventus was there as well. Sora sighed in defeat as he rolled onto his back and glared at them through his lashes. "You look like you've been through a torture device. Did you piss off Elder Vincent or something?"
"No. He was just teaching me defensive measures and..." Sora trailed off as he started piecing his memory back together. He had been dodging the paperclips and something had taken a hold of him. Something that wanted him to try and kill his mentor. Or someone. He sat up and looked down at his hands, remembering the excitement at the thoughts flying through his head. It hadn't felt like his own thoughts at all and that was what scared him.
"Uh, well, they still haven't found out what happened the other day. We did find out the student's name is Ephemer, though," said Roxas, obviously trying to change the subject. "From what I've heard, he's only been here maybe a year. He's some sort of shifter, I think."
"He's a chimera. He can change his body or body parts into four different creatures," Ventus chipped in, taking a seat across from the bed. "There aren't very many in the world. Chimeras are classified as lethal beings if not kept under check. Having the enhanced abilities of those four creatures can amount to such a substantial amount of power that it could cause them to lose control over it. We happen to have two of them here at the Academy."
"So we have two ticking time bombs that could obliterate the school at any moment," piped his brother, his voice a little too cheery for Sora's liking.
"We're all ticking time bombs here, Roxas. Some of them can just be more lethal in a shorter amount of time."
"Speaking of ticking time bombs, we haven't seen Riku anywhere today. If you remember, we didn't see him at breakfast. He wasn't at lunch, either. Kind of suspicious, if you ask me." With their newly forming friendship was a layer of comfort. He felt he could almost talk to them about anything, and apparently it worked the other way around. The brunette raised an eyebrow at Roxas' information, now curious as to why the wolf was missing. He was already clueless of most things that had to do with the shifter. The only solid things he knew was that he was an asshole and that he didn't like him.
"Do you think he had something to do with Ephemer?" Sora asked seriously, headache forgotten as he sat on the edge of his bed, looking between the twins.
Before either of them could respond, they heard a muffled shout on the other side of the room. All three boys clambered to the edge of the curtain separating them from the rest of the room, but as they peeked around the edge of the thick fabric, nobody was in sight. Slowly and carefully, they moved from bed to bed. As the voices became clear enough to hear without straining themselves to listen, they settled at the bed closest to the door, both Sora and Ventus keeping a firm grip on Roxas' shoulders to keep him from moving further.
"I couldn't have done it, Namine. I was...preoccupied most of the afternoon and night. As you can tell." The three boys exchanged a look as they recognized Riku's voice and realized the situation. Namine was questioning Riku about Ephemer. "And even if I did, do you think he would have left that guy with just a shredded shoulder and blunt force trauma? It doesn't add up, so I'd appreciate it if you and Xehanort left me alone."
"I'm sorry, Riku. We just have to question everyone who could have possibly done it. With you being a shifter, it isn't highly unlikely. But I understand what you mean. With your level of control, your shifting would have been too slow to inflict the two different types of injuries. I'll mark you off of the list, but we really should talk about what you're doing to yourself."
"No," the shifter snapped. A rustle of blankets was heard and footsteps sounded across the floor. Another lighter sound of steps sounded after. The boys froze where they crouched, hoping he wasn't moving to leave the room.
"What you're doing isn't only hurting you, but your wolf. You need to stop asking Xion for those restraints. We can find a less scarring method to help you," retorted Namine. A door opened and closed quickly. "Let us help you, Riku. You aren't even working with us!"
A short silence stretched through the room until the door opened again. Sora felt himself grip the frame of the bed he was crouched next to, waiting for the shifter's response to the witch. But none came; only the sound of a zipper and more footsteps. Anger rolled through the brunette as he shot to his feet, heading for the door to the infirmary. He heard Roxas' voice squeak behind him, and before he could reach for the handle, he came face to face with Riku.
"Get out of my way," the shifter growled, pinning his eyes on Sora's face.
"Make me, mutt," the brunette shot back, body tense and ready to retaliate should Riku make a move.
"You really don't want to test my limits."
"How do you even know what they are? You can't even face your own problems!" Riku's hand shot out and grabbed the front of Sora's blue fitted tee, pulling him close enough that the slightly shorter boy could feel the heat of his breath fan across his face.
"Why do you even care?!"
Why did he care? Was it that he even cared at all? Sora couldn't even answer the question. He was frustrated at the fact that the silverette seemed like he was always running away from his problems and finding temporary solutions, and he had only met him by accident two days ago. His eyes dropped to the shifter's neck, then to the wrist of the hand holding him. Puncture wounds adorned his skin, red and irritated from prolonged use of restraints Namine had mentioned. Gritting his teeth, he lifted his eyes back to Riku's face and opened his mouth to test those limits.
"H-hey, I know the infirmary seems like a perfectly good place to be when thinking about causing injuries, but can we take a moment and remember that the Fitness Competition is coming in a week and a half?" Roxas' voice cut through the tensions in the air, causing Sora and Riku to turn their eyes to him and his brother. "I mean, I know it's not a fight or anything, but you guys could, I don't know, compete against each other. Settle the debate on who is better or something. Instead of ripping each other to shreds."
Riku turned his eyes back to the vampire in front of him as he released his shirt, chromatic eyes dancing with a dare and a smirk sliding across his lips.
"I say game on."