Necessary info-dump chapter! Stuff still happens, though. Haha hope you guys enjoy!

Consciousness came gradually. Yang registered that she was lying down on her back on a cushiony surface, her feet propped up on another soft something. Her body felt like a few dozen trucks had run her over, and she was chilly. There was cold sweat sticking to practically every inch of her skin.

She clenched her teeth and tried opening her eyes. A dim, gently flickering orange light was coming from somewhere. That was all Yang could assimilate before her eyes rolled shut again – her vision was blurry and the room was spinning. She was not feeling so good at all. Even her heart was palpitating faster than it should be in this resting state, only adding to her discomfort.

"P-Py – Akouo?" Yang managed, catching herself on saying Pyrrha's real name out loud. She didn't know where she was – it wasn't safe to use real names.

"I'm afraid not."

Yang froze. That wasn't Pyrrha's voice. Not even close. The blonde tried opening her eyes once more, fighting the dizziness and haze to get some sort of idea on her bearings. She was lying on a bed, Yang could gather that much, and there was an electric fireplace on the far wall near the door – at least, it was probably electric, but it was made to look like a real hearth. She tried to find the source of the voice, but a cursory glance revealed nothing and Yang was forced to shut her eyes again before she became nauseous.

She swallowed with difficulty. "Who...who are you?"

The voice didn't answer immediately, as if debating what to say. It came from somewhere on Yang's right when it finally said, bizarrely resigned, "Blake. I'm...the vampire you refused to kill."

The attack came back to her. Black eyes. Shadows coming alive and taking the breath from her. Power.

...Shit.

This was probably one of the worst pieces of information Yang had ever been given, and she was too weak to even appropriately react. If this...Blake was here, wherever here was, then that meant Pyrrha wasn't anywhere nearby. Yang was alone, alone with a vampire who was completely off her rockers, and there was nothing the enforcer could do.

Unless there was? With great effort, Yang searched her pockets for her scroll. She exhaled an anxious breath when her hands came up empty. She didn't have her weapons, either. This bed she was on was going to be her final resting place, it seemed. As her heart rate accelerated more, Yang began to shiver, teeth chattering. Why was she so damn cold? Was this a nightmare?

"You should try to relax," Blake murmured, and she sounded closer. In fact, Yang felt the bed shift, a gentle pressure appearing on her forearm.

Her eyes flew open, defensive instinct shoving the hand away, and Yang stared at the leech in alarm. Her bracer was burning, yet again warding off a charm. That bloodsucker sure was persistent.

But warm, liquid gold gazed back, calm and sorrowful and dejected all at once. Blake lowered her hand and let it rest with the other on her lap. Her Faunus cat ears leaned backwards. "For what it's worth, I'm sorry. You really should rest."

What?

Yang couldn't consolidate the image of the savage, snarling monster from her memory and the despondent woman with a soothing voice sitting near her. It was like they weren't even the same creature – and Yang didn't trust that for one second.

But, gods, those irises were hypnotizing.

Yang tried – really tried – to stay alert and ready to defend herself, but faced with Blake's total lack of hostility, she quickly lost her rush of adrenaline and sunk back into the mattress, even more exhausted than before. Dammit. "Where did you bring m-me?" Assuming this was real at all, of course. Because why in the ever-loving stars would this demon not have killed her yet?

Blake sighed. Not annoyed – just sad, regretful. "How about this… I'll answer your questions, whatever they may be, if you give yourself some time to recover from the blood loss. Your state will worsen if I keep giving you news you won't like."

How nice of you to care. It wasn't like this beast was the cause of the blood loss or anything. Stupid. But Yang didn't have the energy or the strength to argue. And she continued to shiver, wishing the heater was turned up more and that she was anywhere but here. Or that she'd just wake up already.

She felt the vampire stand from the bed, and for a moment it was as if Blake had left the room, but then soon after Yang realized a heavy blanket was being laid upon her. She opened her eyes again, surprised and warily watching Blake make sure the blanket covered all of Yang's body.

But for the life of her, the blonde couldn't relax. This monster could decide to snap at any second and finish her off, and Yang was utterly at her mercy. This kindness couldn't be real. "Why?" she asked, making it clear she wasn't duped.

Gold met lilac in the flickering of the fake flames from the electric hearth. Cascading raven hair framed a softened triangular face but with sharp cheekbones, and in the haze Yang was in, everything about the creature seemed haunting and beautiful to her, and that was all kinds of wrong. Blake sat down again on the edge of the bed, a glint in her eyes. "I can't very well let my source of food die."

There it is. So easily given, too. Yang mulled the words over in her mind, and there was definitely something about it that bothered her, but the longer she thought, the less of a grip on consciousness Yang had. Her eyes fluttered shut once more, and fighting the weight of sleep proved impossible. Despite not feeling safe, and really wanting answers, she was drifting before she even knew it.

When Yang came to again, it was because someone was shaking her.

"Ember! Ember, wake up! Oh, gods…"

The ground was hard and uneven under her back. She wasn't lying on the same surface she'd been on the first time she'd woken up. Yang's eyes flew open and she sat up straight, gasping. Wildly, she looked around and realized Pyrrha was kneeling next to her – and that did absolutely nothing to help the golden girl's confusion. "Akouo?" Yang squinted, and tried to make sense of what was happening, but she was so lost. She held her head in her hands, suddenly feeling weak all over again.

"Can you stand? I'm going to take you back to our apartment." Pyrrha put a comforting hand on Yang's back and rubbed her shoulder.

"I...I think I can." Yang breathed in deeply and then supported some of her weight on one hand to help her stand up slowly. She winced when her ribs throbbed. Pyrrha remained near, though, and when Yang's knees buckled, the redhead immediately slung one of her partner's arms over her shoulders and held on to the blonde's waist.

"What happened to you?"

Yang gave her surroundings another once over, and realization dawned on her. She was back in the alleyway where she had fought that vampire...Blake. But...why was she back here? Had...had she left the area at all? Had that conversation with the leech not, in fact, been real? Yang's head was pounding. Would that creature have made the effort to bring her all the way back here? But for what? Nothing makes sense. "Ughhhh... I don't even know right now. Please, let's just get to the apartment so I can clean up and sit down for a while. And I need painkillers."

"Okay. Let's get you feeling better, then you can explain." Pyrrha helped Yang walk out of the alley, allowing the injured enforcer to lean her as much as she needed, and then eased her into the passenger side of their car once they had reached the side of the road.

As she waited for Pyrrha to get into the driver's seat, Yang impulsively checked her wrist. There. Faint scars, in the shape of two puncture holes and slight tears across, all healed – as if those wounds hadn't been open and bleeding in...at least a month. How much time has passed? It couldn't have been that long. But at least Yang knew that whole fight had actually happened. Anything after that...well, that part seemed to be anyone's guess.

As Pyrrha got into the vehicle, Yang let her hand drop to her lap and rested her head back on the seat. She closed her eyes. "How did you find me?"

"I tracked your scroll?"

"Oh. Huh, I have it with me?" Yang patted her pockets...and sure enough, there was the bump of her scroll in her bomber. She felt her hips, too, and found her guns in their holsters.

"I don't know how long you were lying there; I'm guessing it was since last night, but when I realized you still weren't back early this morning and you hadn't answered any of my messages, I went searching for you."

Yang creased her eyebrows. "Thank you." Quite frankly, that clarified diddly squat. At least her body was already beginning to recover from the blood loss – there were upsides to having superhuman enhancements, after all. But it would still take a few more days before she was in top shape again. That monster nearly bled me dry. Just a little more...and no amount of super healing or resilience could have kept me alive.

It was the closest Yang had ever come to dying.

The thought of that did not sit well with her. Not even a little bit.

Aurora's Archives database had no records of any vampire named Blake. Searching without a last name obviously complicated things...and there was the possibility that Blake was a fake moniker, too. Or that the whole conversation Yang had with this Blake had never even happened to begin with, so of course Aurora wouldn't have any information about her.

Plus, there was the fact that Aurora hadn't ever really intervened in Vale before anyway, so the number of vampires they had on record living in the area were rather minimal.

"A vampire attacked you?" Pyrrha repeated, immediately worried. "You got fed on, didn't you? Show me."

There was no way to hide it, not with the symptoms Yang was exhibiting. But she didn't have to tell Pyrrha she had been a willing victim. Yang first sat down on the couch and put the painkillers in her mouth, then swallowed them with a swig of water. She sighed, put the bottle of water down, and pulled up the sleeve of her jacket so Pyrrha could take a look at her wrist. "The scars are healed so well it's like it happened months ago."

Pyrrha stared at them for a moment, then looked at Yang again. She gently let go of the blonde's wrist. "That is strange. I'm just glad it didn't bleed you dry." She put her hands on her hips. "I think we may have found our number one suspect, though."

Yang rested her head against the back of the couch and closed her eyes. She couldn't refute the suspicions. Despite that creature seemingly insisting she had nothing to do with the disappearances and murders, her behavior told quite the opposite story. As it was, Yang would be forced to stay at the duplex for a few days until she properly recovered. "Just don't go out there by yourself, Pyr," Yang muttered. "I don't think that was an ordinary vampire."

"I won't. And we should stick together from now on, too, no matter what we're doing for this investigation. In the meantime, I'm going to keep up with the remote surveillance and write a report to SUN."

Yang had agreed, then spent the rest of her time doing everything that she could to get better quickly. Which had involved a lot of rest under several layers of blankets, sure, but on the other hand, she'd had ample opportunity to research this crazy, terrifying vampire, and also write a report of her own – again omitting that she had volunteered her blood…or that she had seen any of that shadow smoke stuff.

It felt like her choice was wrong – that Aurora would have negative consequences for her if they found out she had personally fed an aggressive bloodsucker or that she had possibly been affected by a charm. And, more than that, she didn't want to let Pyrrha down.

But Yang was becoming a bit restless. Proof was of her pacing back and forth in the living room, trying to figure out what to do next. But then she remembered the vampires the SRO did know that were currently in Vale. Yang suddenly stopped pacing and looked up from her scroll, struck with inspiration. That's it! She rushed to the kitchen, where Pyrrha was trying to look into some of the clues they had found for their case on the laptop, and put her scroll on the table. "Pyrrha! I figured out a possible lead."

"Oh?" she raised her eyebrows in interest, peering at Yang's scroll. "What is it?"

"A few vampires the SRO has on file have moved here within the last few decades. There's like four of them. We should go question them, see if they know anything, or even at least if they know who that other leech who attacked me is."

Pyrrha grinned. "Good thinking. We better be ready for anything, though. If one or even all of them are involved in these murders and disappearances, we're going to be heading straight into a fight."

"I'll send the coordinates and profiles to your scroll so we can both know what to expect. And – don't worry, I'm ready to get back out there." Yang looked down, though, a wave of guilt taking over her again. She'd already apologized profusely to her partner for slowing them down, and Pyrrha insisted that it was fine, so Yang hadn't brought it up again. But...

"Yang, I know that look. Get out of your head, you're the best partner anyone could ask for." Pyrrha stood up from her chair and put her hand on Yang's shoulder, offering a kind smile. "C'mon, let's gear up and go."

Yang cracked a smile, too, but she knew what she had done, and it did not make her a good teammate or even a good enforcer. Still, she replied, "Thanks. And, yeah, let's do this."

"Well, Akouo, looks like we're crashing a party!"

"In the middle of the day, too. Look at us, being such rebels."

The duo was standing in front of a waterfront high-class venue. The bouncer at the door kept glancing at them suspiciously.

Pyrrha leaned into Yang's side, whispering, "We're gonna need to flash our fake detective badges, aren't we?"

"Yeeeesss!" Yang punched the air and went first, walking right up to the burly man and showing him her scroll with her fake police badge, saying, "Excuse me, sir; VPD, let us in."

He looked the blonde up and down, noting the guns and not appearing particularly pleased, but when Pyrrha came up beside Yang with a similar document, he grunted and moved out of the way. "Yes, sorry, please go in."

Yang winked at Pyrrha as the two entered the venue. When the bouncer was out of earshot, she said, "I always love getting into places just because we're special."

Pyrrha laughed and shook her head. "Let's just keep our eyes open for our friend."

A bluesy saxophone melody reached their ears the further in they walked, until they got into a large, fancy but modern room. The long blackout curtains were mostly drawn, allowing for some sunlight to come in, but the main source of illumination came from pretty lavender LED ambiance lights at the bottom of the walls. There was a bar off to one side, and a fireplace in a large, white brick hearth located in the middle of the room, and a live band set up against the opposing wall.

The partygoers seemed to mostly be composed of classy business people milling about, drinking wine and discussing various matters relating to their companies. Although, now that Yang was observing more attentively, this event seemed to be for a charity of sorts. It was difficult to tell who was hosting it or what it was for, however.

Yang looked down at how she was dressed, which prompted Pyrrha into doing the same to herself, and then the two women looked at each other.

Yang shrugged.

They stood out like a sore thumb in their practical attire, but that was okay. If all went well, they wouldn't be here for very long. And if all didn't go well...

Well.

"Should we just...ask about him?" Yang wondered, going back to surveilling the premises, searching for a face in particular.

"His profile says he works here. Maybe the bartender would know?"

Yang nodded. "It's that or we walk around for a while and hope to bump into him. I think we should ask."

"Let's go then."

Pyrrha headed towards the bar, and Yang followed. They received a few suspicious glances along the way, but nobody tried to stop them. Yang casually sat on one of the stools, propping her elbows on the counter, and Pyrrha took a seat next to her. The blond boy behind the bar was mixing a drink for someone else at the moment.

Yang noticed Pyrrha gazing at him. She grinned. "He's cute, huh?"

Pyrrha immediately blushed and hid her face. "I literally can't take you anywhere. We're on the job."

"Yeah, so? Give him your number."

"You're insufferable."

The boy was done with his other customer, and he started heading over towards the enforcers. He smiled at them, and once he was close enough, he asked, "Hello, ladies. What can I get for you?"

"You can give this girl here your –" Pyrrha's hand slapped over Yang's mouth before she could finish, causing the troublemaker to devolve in a fit of giggles.

Pyrrha cleared her throat, almost as red as her hair, and said, "Sorry, my partner has no social ability whatsoever. Um, we're with the Vale Police Department, we're looking for Flynt Coal. Do you know him?"

The boy seemed to lose some of his suaveness, and he blinked at the redhead like it had just struck him that she was attractive. He at once became more awkward. "Oh, haha... Yeah, uh, I mean, I don't know him, but he's here. On the stage over there." He pointed over at the band.

Pyrrha removed her hand from Yang's face, and they both turned to look at the stage in surprise. There was a pianist, a drummer, and a saxophone player. The latter of the three was standing under a black light, his white shirt glowing, contrasting with his dark complexion stylishly. Yang realized the reason why they had overlooked him was because in here, despite the dim ambiance light, he was wearing a fedora and sunglasses, making him unrecognizable from the image Aurora's SRO had on his profile.

He played the saxophone really well, though – and Yang didn't even like saxophones. He's probably had a lot more time than most to perfect his art. Pyrrha and Yang shared a look, eyebrows arched. They were usually dispatched to take care of unruly vampires – it was always weird to come across those who conformed to society and lived among humans like they were regular people, too.

This man was probably not a suspect. But they would speak with him anyway.

"We should go make sure he knows we're here," Yang suggested.

Pyrrha turned back towards the bartender. "Hey, thank you for your help. And..." she glanced at Yang and sighed with a small smile, "do you have a pen and paper?"

Yang giggled again and waited for Pyrrha to give her number to the boy, who had introduced himself as Jaune and he seemed utterly flustered by Pyrrha's attention, and then the two enforcers walked away from the counter to head towards the stage. They stood several feet from it, but made sure to be in Flynt's direct view. Yang crossed her arms and Pyrrha put her hand on her hip.

He tipped his head while blowing into his instrument, not missing a beat, and his dark eyes briefly met with the two women above the rim of his rectangular sunglasses. That was all the sign he gave that he knew they were there – he just kept playing afterwards.

"I guess we'll wait for his tune to be over," Pyrrha murmured, and Yang agreed. They walked over to the wall, where there were two armchairs placed in front of one another, a small table between them. The girls sat down, getting comfortable.

"Well, it definitely makes it easier on us if there's only four bloodsuckers – well, five, apparently – in the area, I gotta say. Can you imagine if we were in Mistral?"

"We'd be begging for help just to question people," Pyrrha laughed. "At least this Flynt guy seems like he'll cooperate if we're patient."

"Hopefully he knows stuff." Yang then grinned. "Hey, you should text Jaune right now."

"Ember, you're only going to be satisfied once I've married the guy. Also, I will have my revenge, just you wait."

Yang snickered. Before she could say anything, though, they heard the music come to a close, and switched their attentions to the stage to make sure Flynt didn't decide to make a run for it. Fortunately, all he did was whisper something to the pianist, and then he rested his saxophone on its stand before striding off the stage. The pianist began playing another jazzy tune, and Flynt made his way over to the enforcers.

"Please, follow me. We'll talk somewhere more discreet." His tone wasn't exactly friendly, but at least he wasn't making a scene – and he clearly knew they were enforcers.

"Lead the way."

Pyrrha and Yang stood, and they followed Flynt to the very back of the main room, where there were three arches that seemed to lead into another part of the venue. He went through the right-most one, and then opened a door almost immediately to the right again in the hallway.

They found themselves in a performer's lounge, brightly illuminated, and with plenty of seating space. There was no one else here. Flynt motioned at a couch, and the young women sat there while he took the armchair in front of them, putting his legs up on the coffee table between them.

"So, what can I do for Aurora?" he asked, vaguely annoyed. He touched his fingers together, resting his elbows on the armchair's arms. His expression was unreadable.

"Well, I'm sure you've heard about the murders and disappearances that happened in Vale recently," Pyrrha started, keeping her voice calm.

"I have. I should have also known Aurora would send their dogs sniffing into my business about it, too." He tilted his head. "I have nothing to do with what happened. I'm just trying to live normally to the best of my abilities."

"We figured as much," Yang offered, "and we're not here to accuse you of anything. We just have a few questions."

"Of course you do." Flynt sighed and made a gesture like a shoo with his hand. "Go on, then, let's get this done and over with."

Yang nodded at Pyrrha, so the redhead asked, "Why did you move to Vale?"

"Because I'd heard that Aurora's presence in Vale was nonexistent, and I could make a name for myself here doing what I love without constantly being questioned by enforcers – like you are now, mind you – the moment a vampire caused problems. Simple enough."

Yang tried to keep her expression neutral, but she cringed inside. Flynt's implied criticism wasn't wrong – even Yang and Pyrrha had been forced to interrogate a few vampires here and there that they'd already met a couple times before. Sometimes they picked who they questioned based on suspicions, but other times SUN directed them towards specific suspects more than once – and not necessarily without reason, but still – and it was almost always unpleasant for all parties involved.

"Yes, well, we're hoping to keep this conversation brief, too," Pyrrha tried compassionately. "You wouldn't happen to know who is behind the acts of violence here, would you?"

Flynt shook his head. "I don't hang around other vampires. Sorry."

Yang suddenly leaned forward, his earlier response making a question spring up in her mind along with an inkling he hadn't said the whole truth. "Hold on. How did you hear Aurora's presence in Vale was nonexistent?"

Flynt frowned and waved his hand. "Fine, I know of a few vampires, but I don't hang around them. Anyway, Cardin Winchester told me. I don't know much of what he does with his undying life, though."

Yang and Pyrrha shared a look. Cardin was one of the four vampires they wanted to meet with today. "...Okay, so who are the other vampires you know of?" Pyrrha asked more pointedly.

"Apart from Winchester? There's Mocha, Vulpes, and Axis." Flynt paused and then crossed his ankles on the coffee table. "I think there are supposed to be others, but I don't know them."

Uh-oh. Yang gave Pyrrha a concerned look, which she returned as a side-glance while she took out her scroll and quickly searched Aurora's database. Those names weren't real names – they were aliases. Aliases meant those vampires were most likely at least over a century old. The SRO had been able to keep track of a few of them, especially the more recent ones, but most times the information Aurora possessed regarding vampires with aliases was based on events in history pulled from the Archives – meaning some profiles weren't necessarily accurate or even true – or some vampires had just not chosen to take on aliases at all.

More worrying than this, though, was the fact that Flynt's news revealed there were more than four or five leeches hanging around Vale – somehow. Aurora did not have an established presence here, meaning there were no synthetic plasma sites, or any blood pack cold storage units meant for vampires, specifically. And yet, despite that, it was only now, over three-hundred years since Vale came into existence, that SUN had to send in enforcers to take care of a vampire problem.

Something was absolutely regulating vampires in Vale, and it wasn't Aurora.

But whatever it was, it wasn't doing it anymore.

Pyrrha put her scroll away and shook her head at Yang. "No relation to our vamps on file."

Our job just got quite a bit more complicated. Maybe Mistral isn't so bad, after all. Yang took a calming breath in. "Can you give us an estimate on the number of vampires you think are here?"

Flynt shrugged. "Can't say. I only just got here within the past decade. There must be at least a dozen."

This was getting on Yang's nerves. And she could tell Pyrrha was realizing how much bigger their task had gotten, too. All these vampires – undocumented. And any one of them could be their culprit(s). Yang couldn't help it, she stood and began pacing, the nervous energy needing an outlet. "Where do you get your blood, Flynt?" she asked, gazing at him sharply.

He seemed to warily watch her move from one side of the room to the other for a second before he replied, "Cryolife is the company that supplies the blood packs. I think Winchester actually works at the storage facility where I and others go to get what we need." Flynt suddenly took his feet off the table and leaned forward, causing Yang to stop pacing. "Look, are we done here? That's all I have, and I'm supposed to be performing right now. This doesn't look good on me."

Yang looked over at Pyrrha. She shook her head. There wasn't much else they could ask Flynt anyway, and he was right – for all intents and purposes, he was just trying to live his life and now people had just seen two 'police detectives'walk in to speak with him in private. It was time to leave him alone. "Yeah, that's everything. Thanks, Flynt."

Pyrrha stood, too, also thanking him, and then the two enforcers headed out, yet again ignoring all the looks sent their way. Once they were inside their vehicle, Pyrrha in the driver's seat, Yang said immediately after shutting the door, "We should go see Cardin next, since he seems to know a little more about the vamps around here...and it sounded like he's the one who even invited some of them to Vale."

Pyrrha put the car into gear and began driving. "Yes, I got that impression, too. We'll check his residence first. Also, Mocha, Vulpes, and Axis were not in Aurora's database. Can you look up Cryolife?"

Yang took out her scroll and searched the name on the web. "Uh…" She skimmed several lines of information first, then said, "They're a genetics research company? I mean, I guess that makes sense with why they would have blood packs. And they're based in…" Her eyes widened. "Atlas. With a lab and a warehouse in Vale. Holy shit. It says Cryolife is affiliated to the Schnee Minerals Company?"

"Schnee? Why would a mining company be affiliated with a genetics research company? Main shareholder or something? Whatever, that still wouldn't make sense. Yang, this is so bad. Once we've spoken to the three other vampires we know are here, we need to request backup and see what Aurora thinks of all this."

Yang put her scroll away. "Yeah…it's definitely looking like we're in over our heads." But now they had some idea of what was happening behind the scenes in Vale and Atlas regarding vampires. Cryolife was providing blood packs. But who was keeping – and then no longer keeping – the vampires in line?

That's not our job here, though. We're literally just trying to figure out who killed and abducted those humans. She obviously also wanted to know who the bloodsucker that had attacked her was, too – because it was highly likely that those two things had the very same culprit. Yang had an itch to look at the scars on her wrist again, but she kept her hands on her lap. Can't believe I just allowed a leech to practically suck me dry.

Whatever was going on in Vale, Yang had a sinking feeling they would be stuck investigating it for a long while still, that they were just uncovering the tip of the iceberg, and it wasn't going to be easy figuring out how everything related to each other.

It was entirely possible four months wouldn't be enough time, after all.

Nobody seemed to be home at Cardin Winchester's residence. That didn't deter the enforcer duo, though. Yang and Pyrrha decided to take a risk and go looking for him at Cryolife's facilities location next, since Flynt had mentioned he thought Cardin worked there.

Cryolife's laboratory and warehouse appeared to be connected, but the premises weren't particularly large. In fact, Pyrrha almost missed it. It was nestled between other factories in the industrial area of Vale – not anywhere random people would go at any point. The area was fenced off, only accessible through a gate with a checkpoint post.

Pyrrha turned in and opened her window so she could speak with the guard.

"Authorized personnel only, state your business," he said, sounding mildly bored.

"Vale Police Department. We're here to speak with Cardin Winchester." Pyrrha showed him her fake badge.

This information seemed to trigger his interest – and suspicion. "Please, wait." He typed on his computer for a moment, and it seemed to take longer than necessary, but then his attention went back to the girls. "Sorry, ma'am. I can't let you in. That's not a real police badge. Please, leave."

Yang and Pyrrha shared a shocked expression. How could he know that? "Can you at least tell us if Cardin is here, and if he is, when does his shift end?"

"No. I don't know who you are, but if you don't back out of here, I'll be notifying the real VPD. Again, please, leave."

"Alright, we're leaving." Pyrrha closed her window and backed out, getting onto the road again and following it for a while. "Guess we're just gonna have to do it the old way," she muttered.

"Adventure time it is," Yang agreed.

Pyrrha parked on the side of the road, and then both girls got out, making sure they were fully geared up. They then made their way back to where they had come from, but stopped when they reached the fence surrounding Cryolife's premises. From this angle, they could actually see a transport truck docked near the back of the warehouse – that was probably their best bet to get in.

Yang grinned. "Let's do this."

Pyrrha smiled, too, and then the enforcers cleared the fence in one jump. They immediately sprinted, reaching the back of the warehouse in a few short seconds, and made their way around the truck quietly.

…Only to come face to face with Cardin, himself.

It looked like he had been the one unloading the truck. But now he was staring at them like he had known they were there – which wouldn't be a surprise. He had probably caught their scent and heard their heartbeats.

He did not look happy to see them.

"Hello, Cardin," Pyrrha said, taking on a jovial tone. "We need to ask you a few questions. Would that be alright?"

His frown became an outright glower. "No. It's not alright. Fuck off, bitch."

Yang's hand hovered near her gun. This creature could get violent easily. "C'mon, man. We don't want to be bothering you, either. Just answer a few questions, and then we'll get out of your hair."

In the blink of an eye, the vampire lunged forward to punch Yang in the face. His fist nearly connected – she moved to the side at the last second, only to have his other fist come swinging from the other direction. Yang stumbled into Pyrrha trying to get out of the way, and her partner grabbed her shoulders and jumped up backwards, bringing both of them onto the top of the transport truck's trailer.

They drew their guns and aimed down at Cardin, who glared up at them with a snarl.

"Cardin, stand down," Pyrrha ordered, "or we will be forced to apprehend you. This doesn't have to get messy."

"We literally just want to ask like three questions," Yang added, "and if you're not guilty, then there's no reason to fight."

Cardin growled, low in his throat. "I came to Vale to get away from you enforcers," he spat, saying the word like it was vile. "You just can't leave us alone, can you? We're not doing anything wrong! We're just trying to live like any other person."

"I understand that, Cardin. We're not accusing you of anything, and we're not here to put our noses in your business." Pyrrha kept her voice calm and conciliatory, and Yang almost envied her. She was the best at diffusing these types of tense situations.

"But you are!" Cardin hissed, and suddenly he grabbed the underside of the trailer and flipped the whole truck over, causing a raucous as the boxes and containers inside came loose.

Yang and Pyrrha fell backwards, managing to land fairly safely, but Cardin was already attacking them. He rushed Pyrrha from behind, grabbing her by the nape and sending her crashing into the pavement, hard enough that it cracked.

"Akouo!" Yang immediately took the opening and shot Cardin. The electric nodes caught him in the shoulder, and they made him groan and tense up, releasing Pyrrha. The warrior began trying to stand again, blood running down her face from bad scratches on her forehead and cheek, and Yang raced over, getting her cuffs out.

She reached for one of Cardin's wrists, but he was apparently already recovering from the electric shocks and he was the one to grip her arm instead – and twisted. Yang cried out, dropping the cuffs and trying to turn and stop her arm from getting broken. She aimed her gun at him again, but he grabbed that wrist, too, and used his greater strength against her, forcing her to let go of her gun as well.

Yang slowly sunk to her knees with the effort it took to battle Cardin's leverage, and just when she thought she was about to lose the usage of both her arms, Pyrrha came in between the two figures with the silver spear she kept in its minimized form at her belt, and ran it through Cardin's stomach with a shout.

The vampire immediately released Yang and backed up, roaring and seething while the wound sizzled and burned him. But his anger was greater than the pain, and red eyes locked onto the enforcers. He pulled the spear from his abdomen and threw it back at Pyrrha, who dodged out of the way with an acrobatic flip, but Cardin rushed her just as she was landing and bashed her head into the metal trailer. She went limp that time.

"Oh, now you've done it," Yang grumbled. She drew her second gun, the one with the UV-C bullets in its clip, and aimed it at the vampire just as he was turning towards her.

But then he stopped, and it took all of Yang's willpower to not shoot him anyway while he was an extremely easy target. Even more weirdly, though, his expression slowly went from enraged to...very afraid. At first, Yang thought it was the threat of possibly being shot by light bullets that made him capitulate, but then she realized he was staring at something behind her. But she didn't dare look, just in case it was a trick. She wouldn't fall for that one, not when this fight wasn't going so well.

Except…then she saw the shadows. They extended past her legs, reaching like ghostly black claws towards Cardin, and Yang could feel a presence near her, cool and all-consuming and powerful. She froze. There was definitely something behind her.

"N-Nightshade," Cardin stuttered, and he tried to take a step back, but the shadows grabbed his ankles and then his calves, and it was like he was stuck. "What are you doing here? I thought you were –"

"Gone? Dead?" came a quiet voice, but it sent chills up Yang's spine because it was coming from all around them, clear, authoritative, and deadly. "I thought I made myself very clear with you, Cardin. Don't. Touch. What is. Mine."

If it were possible for a vampire to look any paler, Cardin certainly looked the part. "I-I wouldn't dream of it, Nightshade. I'm sorry, I didn't realize I was encroaching on your territory."

For a short moment, there was silence and nothing happened, although Yang swore she felt something brush her shoulder and she nearly jumped out of her skin. But then a cloud of black smoke floated up from the shadows near Cardin's feet, and it began to take on the shape of something resembling a woman – except it had huge wings and it looked more demon than human with its razor claws and triple-jointed legs, something like horns atop its head. Cardin's eyes widened, and he was visibly shaking. Before the smoke could truly solidify though, it suddenly shoved explosively into him, literally sending him into the pavement, which crumbled and shook, and dust blew up in a plume as he was presumably sent further into the ground.

And then the smoke and shadows were gone, as if they'd never been there at all.

Yang remained very still, waiting. She strained to hear anything out of the ordinary, or see anything unnatural, but after several moments, she had to assume that whatever the hell that had just been, it was gone. She looked down towards Pyrrha, seeing that the redhead was conscious now, raised on her forearms, and she met Yang's stare in horror.

"What...what was that?" Pyrrha whispered.

Heart pounding, Yang sunk down to the pavement next to her partner, equally stunned. "I..." Her mind was racing. Those shadows and smoke looked awfully familiar. But that demon figure? Nope. The voice… It sounded raspier, colder, harsher, but that subtle accent was hard to mistaken… Yang rested her forehead on her hands, suddenly trying to keep herself from hyperventilating. It couldn't be. "I…I think that might have been the vampire who attacked me…"

"What?" Pyrrha lifted herself up more, eyes wide. "That was a vampire? Ember, excuse my language, really, but what the fuck?"

Yang shrugged helplessly. Pyrrha must have been completely rattled to be using swear words, and Yang understood the feeling. Something was dawning on her, and she was fighting her mind from actually letting it settle because the truth of it threatened to send her into an outright panic attack. "I don't know, okay? I've never seen anything like it. Are you alright, by the way?"

The warrior started to get herself to her feet, holding her head and wiping the blood from her brow. She rolled her shoulders. "Yes, I'm fine. Just going to have some cuts and bruises for a few hours. We should check on Cardin... And then we're going to request backup. This is...more than what we're equipped to handle."

Pyrrha helped Yang to her feet, and once they had their weapons again, they cautiously approached the hole in the ground.

Yang couldn't be certain if that shadowy apparition was, in fact, the same vampire who had attacked her before – if it was a vampire at all, but the conversation Cardin had held with it implied that it was. Nightshade. A deadly, poisonous plant. An apex predator, a thousand times more powerful than some newbie vampire.

Pyrrha stepped closer to the hole and peered down into it while Yang remained vigilant of their surroundings. The redhead carefully descended into it.

"Don't. Touch. What is. Mine." It was that one line which made Yang truly think that creature was the same that had attacked her. And, in which case...was she only defending her food? Or...

Yang raised her wrist. Her hand was shaking. "You will be the only one I will ever be able to drink from again." The memory of those words whispered in her mind, and the gravity of them finally did settle on Yang like a crushing weight against her best wishes. Her next breath was hard to draw.

That monster, that eldritch nightmare, was going to come for Yang again. To feed. And Yang didn't know when, or how, or where, and there was absolutely nothing she could do about it. The one thing that could kill vampires, the UV-C bullets, this Nightshade could turn herself incorporeal and render them useless.

"He's gone," Pyrrha announced, and a short moment later, she came back up out of the hole beside Yang.

"Damn, what do you mean, gone? Dead?" the blonde muttered, disbelieving.

"There's nothing down there. He either left while we weren't looking...or whatever that thing was, it wiped him from the face of Remnant."

Yang tried really, really hard to control her breathing. It's going to come after you next, Yang. She started pacing, passing her hand through her hair stressfully. "Damn," she mumbled again.

"Ember? Are you okay?"

Yang hadn't told Pyrrha what the vampire had said. She hadn't told her partner she had been the one to essentially force that monster to drink from her. And there was no possible way in which Yang could tell the truth now, even though that would have been the sensible, caring thing to do. "Yeah, yeah..." she sighed heavily, "I'm fine. Just...overwhelmed right now. Looks like we won't be getting our answers from Cardin."

"No... Either way, we're not continuing this investigation until we've reported what happened here to SUN and wait for them to tell us what to do next. Come, let's head back." Pyrrha started walking towards the fence at the end of the parking lot, so Yang holstered her gun and followed. "We need reinforcements."

We need an army. Yang didn't say that out loud, though.

She should have known that whatever was happening in Vale for the first time in Aurora's history wasn't going to be anything easy or normal.

And Yang had invited the devil, herself, into her veins.

Next chapter will hopefully be out soon-ish as well, since it's already half done. As always, I'm open to criticisms and suggestions! There's definitely some parts in this chapter that I feel could have been smoother, but, ultimately, I think it gets the job done. Thank you again to Wolfcreations21 and my wonderful girlfriend, Bumblebye, for the support!