Chapter Three: The Discovery

The sun was setting now, so it was a good time for Lincoln to be walking home. The waning light of the setting sun meant that the sunblock was more than sufficient to protect him from the sun's harmful rays. He set out across Royal Woods, smiling and breathing in the cold night air. The cold didn't seem to bother him anymore. He still seemed to be breathing, so that meant that even as a Vampire, he was still alive, even if he wasn't human anymore.

As he was walking, it started to snow. It had been cloudy all day and it was scheduled to snow that night anyway. He sighed as he looked around. He could see so much clearer now. His eyes, his bionic eyes were powerful. Even in the dark, he could see in perfect color. Even with the snow starting to come down harder, he could see perfectly. In fact, he could strangely see in more colors now than he could before. He didn't know exactly what was going on, but he assumed that his eyes had more, far more than three color cones in each of them.

Now, considering these were bionic, there were no actual cones in them, but the mechanical equivalent of many color cones. And they probably combined the color combinations in rapid succession to allow his eyes to act as though he had all those color cones. His vision was also perfect, despite no moon and no stars tonight. Out of the corner of his eye, he thought he saw something moving. He stopped and looked around, narrowing his eyes, surprised when he saw them zooming in and out, changing from the normal colors that he was seeing to a red color to a green color to a strange mix of colors.

He didn't know this right now, but he was seeing in various spectrums, from electromagnetic vision to infrared vision to the actual night vision function. It was weird to see his eyes changing like this, but he used them and looked around, zooming in and out at various intervals, using X-Ray Vision and realizing that he was seeing through a wall. He didn't see anything more move, so he shrugged and continued walking. He headed towards his home and finally made it, surprising himself when he knocked on the door. He didn't have to knock. It was his house. But he felt the need to.

"I-Lincoln." Jordan said, hugging him tightly, kissing him adoringly.

"Lincoln, I'm so glad you're back. What happened? You've been gone for a week!" She said, pulling him into the house.

"Can I make something for you to eat?" Jordan asked. Lincoln smiled, shaking his head.

"No, I'm… I'm okay." Lincoln said, sighing and sitting down on the couch. He patted his lap. Jordan immediately sat down on his lap, hugging him tightly.

She'd grown a lot as a person. She still wasn't usually this affectionate. She liked cuddling with him sometimes, but she rarely sat on his lap. He held her close, kissing her lovingly, feeling grateful just to be alive and in her arms again. He felt grateful for both his lovers. But right now, he was just with Jordan. He kissed her again on the lips. He stroked her hair.

"After I found out what happened to you… At first, I thought… Maybe you just went to take a hike. But you'd never do that without telling someone." Jordan said.

"I hoped at first that you were still alive… You're certain you're not a ghost?" Jordan asked.

"Well, that might be the second best thing in Lucy's book. But no, I'm not a ghost. I'm actually… Well… You might find this hard to believe. You might think I'm crazy. But I promise I'll show you evidence of my claim once I'm done telling you what happened." Lincoln said.

"Deal?" He asked. Jordan nodded numbly. What could he tell her that she would find so hard to believe?

"Okay, so you remember the party. It was great. Clyde and Chloe announced their engagement at it. We all had a blast. If I'd known that it was going to run so late, I definitely would have driven there rather than walked. But it was a surprisingly warm day and I decided to get some light exercise. Of course, if I'd really been thinking, I would have been walking the other direction to go to yours and my home and I wouldn't have been walking. We could have driven. But there you go." Lincoln chuckled sheepishly.

"Anyway, I was walking when this woman approached me. I was a bit lost at the time. I was a bit buzzed, not really drunk. I don't get drunk. The nanomachines prevent that. But I was buzzed and still getting my bearings, and this woman approached me and said I could stay at her house for the night and walk home in the morning. Swear to Hecate and Hades that I wasn't planning to have sex with her. Anyway, I got there and she locked the door. And I uh… Made a joke about Vampires because she had tinted windows on her home. She started going off about how her mistress called them Kindred.

"It was a long spiel, but she talked about how she herself didn't like the word because it implied Vampires had some kind of common organization amongst all of them, which they didn't. And I thought she was crazy. But then she shoved me and I flew across the room. We fought a bit. Trust me, it wasn't much of a fight, she won. Easily. And she raped me and tortured me. Don't laugh. It's not funny. She raped me and tortured me and she bit me and drained my blood.

"I woke up today and bought some clothes from a homeless person for the 600 dollars I had in my wallet. If I'd been thinking, I probably would have offered him 50 and he would have probably jumped at the chance. But I was still dazed and sore and I gave him 600 dollars for clothes stained with I don't want to think what. But I walked home and everyone jumped on me. Mom was screaming at the po… I'm getting into a bit too much detail. I'll show you the evidence I have for my claim and you can decide for yourself if you believe me." Lincoln said, showing her his fangs. His sharp canines.

He showed her the bite mark on his neck and pulled off his shirt, showing the now starting to fade, but still visible scars on his chest, stomach, arms, legs and back. Jordan hissed in empathy at how much those must have hurt. There were a lot of them that were bite marks. They were deep and messy and whoever this was who'd done all this to him, had clearly hurt him. He stood up and went to the chairs and lifted one with one arm and one with the other. He didn't have the balance yet to juggle them or do tricks with them, but he lifted them seemingly with no effort. Jordan whistled, impressed.

"Nice, nice. Anything else you care to show off to me?" She teased. She believed him now. There were few explanations for his sudden growth in strength, his razor sharp canines, the bite marks and other wounds on him and she knew that he wasn't a liar. He was good at getting what he wanted. He was the Man with the Plan. But she'd never known him to lie to her.

There was a knock at the door. Lincoln went to answer the door.

"Ah! Lucy. Come in." Lincoln said. Now he'd told Jordan what he knew of the situation, he had all three of them together on this. She kissed Lincoln lovingly on the lips. Jordan smiled. While she hadn't been entirely sure about the relationship at first, she'd accepted that a man in a family as closely bonded as the Louds, it was possible that he would experience some 'unbrotherly feelings' towards one of his admittedly very attractive sisters.

In all the time Lucy and Jordan had been Lincoln's girlfriends, Lucy only had sex with Jordan once. And Jordan suspected that was because Lucy felt she had to in order to make Lincoln happy. Lucy wasn't really into girls

-0-

"It is a nice night. I do love the snow." Nearra said, looking up, letting a sense of vertigo overcome her as she stared up into the heavens and enjoyed the sensation of spinning as she felt the snow falling down directly on her face. She regretted that she'd had to kill Lincoln. Perhaps she could have permitted him to live as her Childe. She could have taught him everything she knew about being a Child of the Night as she sometimes called them. It seemed as good a phrase as any. Nightling, she also used sometimes. Whatever she chose to call them at the moment, it required training to master the condition.

And as… Eccentric as she was, she knew a great deal about it. She was over 700 years old. She didn't know her exact age. It had been lost in the fog of being so old. She was older than the United States though. She remembered coming over with immigrants, feeding on the ill on the ship. Sick blood didn't taste good, but it sustained her on the relatively short trip and she managed to survive after only hunting once. She'd made sure to hunt immediately before she got on the ship, so she only needed to hunt once when she was on the ship, though she was direly hungry when she got there.

The trip had been a miserable ten days, and she had to hunt the ones they put down in the hull when they got sick. The ship was infested with lice and fleas and rats, both of which she was grateful avoided her. But the sounds of chittering and scratching drove her crazy. But she made it to the New World, a whole new adventure. She'd needed to hunt almost immediately, slipping through Ellis Island, hiding in the docks and slipping out at night, preying on an immigrant who'd been crippled in a factory and thus, became homeless, begging for scraps of food or any piece of change that anyone could offer.

She didn't love hunting for those who couldn't run or fight back. But she needed the blood, and whole and healthy individuals were rare in the part of town she was in and it would have been dangerous to hunt in the upper scale areas. She'd not had a truly good hunt in a long while, and while Lincoln was hardly the strongest individual she'd hunted, he'd been fun. He had a strong will to live and he fought. Hard. She'd loved the fact that he fought back against her and that he hadn't just submitted to his death, though she wished he'd fought for longer, given her more of a fight.

But she assumed he must have started to become anemic after she bit and cut him so many times. Even with his remarkably fast healing for a normal human, he must have lost quite a bit of blood from the wounds and the pain probably put him into shock. Still, she'd had fun. She was looking around. She was once again on the hunt. She was perfectly happy to hunt every 5-7 days. Even if she was a little insane, she still respected the fact that she didn't need to hunt any more often and the fact that if she hunted as often as she wanted, she would be noticed very quickly.

Her servant was a bit annoying. He reminded her far more often than she would prefer to hunt the homeless and those who had no obvious connections or recourse against her predations. But she'd wanted a treat that night. She'd been 'good' for a long time and she wanted a treat. She'd earned a treat she felt. So she hunted... Lincoln. How was that possible. She'd drained Lincoln dry. But he was walking around. She saw him walking, with purpose. She didn't know where he was going, but she was going to find out. He seemed to enjoy going places at night and walking there.

Though she assumed he would have learned his lesson the last time when she preyed on him. Still, some humans never learned. But how was he alive? Had he bitten her? Was he a Vampire? That was bad. Even as sometimes insane as she was, she knew that a second Vampire in a city as relatively small as theirs could pose a potential security risk for both of them. She would have to find out what was going on and deal with it. She fell into step behind him, making sure to stay out of his shadow and out of his sight and smell range. She didn't want a fight. She was interested to see what had happened.

She hadn't had prey that fought back as hard as Lincoln had in a long time. Back when she lived in Egypt in the 1600s, she sought out prey that would fight back, even if they didn't give her a strong fight, the hunt and the fight was the best part and of her coven, she was the best huntress. She followed Lincoln, gasping as she saw him stop and look around, narrowing his eyes. His eyes seemed to be glowing ever so slightly in the dark as he looked and she could have sworn she saw his eyes contracting and dilating as he looked around, almost like he had control over them. She didn't understand it.

That was impossible, even for Vampires. She hid and waited for him to continue walking. She continued following, being more cautious now, finally seeing him walk up to a modern and quite handsome looking home. He didn't actually live that far from her. He knocked on the door and a woman of moderate height came to the door, hugging him tightly. She could see the woman's lips moving and saw her greeting him and saying that she'd thought he was dead. She brought him inside and then closed the door. But now Nearra knew where he lived. Now, was this his home or was his home in the other direction?

He'd been walking in the other direction. So maybe that was his parents' house in that direction. Or maybe he headed the wrong way that night when he left wherever he was going. He seemed like a young adult from his appearance, so maybe this was his home. She considered what she should do. She could go and knock on his door and demand answers. She had no powers to force him to give her answers. But she could metaphorically hold his woman hostage and ask very politely for him to answer her questions. She stood outside on the sidewalk, watching his house, considering her options.

Then, she saw a slender woman in a black jacket and dark grey hat walk up to the house. She had jet black hair and was quite beautiful. Was she a friend of theirs? A mutual lover of the two? Either way, Lincoln was becoming truly interesting to her. If he was in a poly relationship with the brown haired girl and now also the black haired girl. If he was cheating on the brown haired girl with the black haired girl. Either way, this seemed like it could be fun to look into further. She left for now, going back to her home.

"Connor…" Nearra said, walking into the house and immediately calling her servant.

He came down, bowing politely to her.

"How can I help you, Mistress?" He asked in his charming Irish accent. While it had been over 160 years since she first Culled him, he never lost his melodious accent.

"I want you to do some research on the inhabitants of 1402 Maple Boulevard. Go there and learn everything you can about them." Nearra commanded. He nodded.

"Yes, Ma'am. Can you tell me anything you already know about them?"

"One of them is Lincoln, the young man I killed a full week ago. Somehow, he's still alive and walking around." Nearra said. Connor noticed she seemed a little unnerved by this. She clearly hadn't meant to let him live. Whether he was a Vampire right now or just survived the attack was uncertain. But she'd clearly meant to kill him, given that she'd ordered him to dispose of Lincoln's body.

"One of them is a woman with brown hair that goes down to the middle of her back. I don't know her name, but she and he kissed, so they seem to be lovers.

"There's another woman who came to the house with shorter black hair that goes down to her shoulders and seems to cover her eyes. She seems to prefer a black or dark aesthetic and she went up to the house and was invited in. So whether she was their mutual lover, whether Lincoln or the woman were cheating on the other with her or what, I don't know. But they bear being watched. I want to find out what they're doing and how they're doing it. I want to know how Lincoln survived my attack, who those women are, what he plans to do with them. I don't want three more Nightlings walking around Royal Woods.

"I want this problem nipped in the bud sooner rather than later." She said.

"You know; I understand your concern. But I doubt that one or even three more Nightlings would create a major problem. You could confront Lincoln and impress upon him the value of hunting those who by virtue of their status would raise few red flags if they went missing and would not be searched for for very long." Connor said calmly. He was a much calmer individual than Nearra. While he'd calmed over the years, Nearra had become more rambunctious over the centuries.