Disclaimer: I don't own the x-men or any other marvel characters. Duh! But I do own Driani and any other characters that aren't marvel-made. Copy them at your own peril. I mean it. They are my intellectual property and I do not take plagiarism lightly.

This was the end. She was sure of it now. Driani and Stephen had been fighting nonstop for over a week with a huge mob that was determined to kill them. Leaving the tower, they thought it would be easy to wipe out the fifty people who surrounded their castle. Hand to hand combat with mortals had seemed terribely simple at first, but eventually the crowds numbers swelled to the point that their wasn't any fighting space and they had fled back to the tower. The siege had lasted past the point that even a supremely powerful immortal could bear. The villagers were going to wear them out, and they had nearly succeeded...

For over eight hundred years Stephen's family had ruled Castle Vanqueri and the surrounding villages, and Stephen had ruled for the past five hundred years. One of Dracula's brides had done it as a joke. Stephen was not on speaking terms with any of the four of them since he had never quite forgiven them for taking away his mortality, but he enjoyed his powers. For four hundred he lived happily, ruling the inhabitants of his land by fear and killing sporadically so as not to arouse suspicion. Then he got lonely. Imagine his luck that a mere twenty-four years ago one of the first ever mutants had been born right on his estate! It was her particular mutation that drew Stephen to Driani. Her DNA not only gave her several vampiric talents like memory manipulation and superhuman strength, but also the ability to retain her humanity when blessed/cursed (depends on how you look at it) with a vampire's kiss. As such she was a semi-vampire, living only on blood and morphing into human/bat form, while not truly immortal and in a state of suspended aging. Once he had made her as close to a vampire as he could, she hated him. But she came around, as he knew she would, and grew to love him as much as he already loved her. They were so happy. They traveled the world together, Driani learning various fighting forms and languages as they went and Stephen picking up the newest sciences and literary achievements. When they had returned from their hundred year honeymoon, they realized that they couldn't stay in one place to long in case one of them slid too far into their inner beast and wasn't able to control their actions. But that revelation had come to late, hadn't it, Stephen thought wryly to himself. Because now Driani had gone a three-month killing spree that had left dozens dead. When she finally came to, not only had the superstitious villagers figured out their secret, they had decided to do something about them. That 'something' came in the form of killing them.

Short of maintaining a kind of telekinetic bubble around herself and her boyfriend, Driani was powerless to prevent the impending doom that awaited her. She had been drained when she finally retained her human form, but all the fighting had left her completely exhausted. Her 'human form' was not truly human but actually a mutant. She was petite, only 5'3", with pale skin, deep brown eyes, long wavy black hair, and powers that allowed her to adapt to vampirism without losing all humanity. She used to hate her appearance because she felt she looked helpless and meek, adjectives that didn't suit her vibrant personality at all. She had preferred her vampiric form, a tall winged creature with dark skin and dangerous fangs. The past few months she had been in the totally reversed state of any human, a primal wolf-like beast. She hated being like that, hated the death and destruction she brought, but it was necessary to keep her alive. But now, during what just might be her final hour, she chose to look human, as did Stephen. She admired, for what she was now positive would be the last time, his well-muscled body, silky hair and beautiful hazel eyes. "Stephen, I can't hold up any longer." Driani said sadly. "Me neither."

"So what do we do?"

"I don't know, Dri, but how about we go down fighting, if go down we must?"

"Kiss me goodbye then. Who would have thought that a life time one hundred and thirty years long would feel so short when it ends?" And end it would have, if not for the timely arrival of the jet that was currently hovering 30,000 feet above them.

"Okay, prepare to disembark. We've arrived" Nightcrawler skillfully maneuvered the jet to right over Cerebro's targets. The Blackbird jet was state of the art with some of the best technology not just in the world but in the universe, thanks to the alien races the x-men had come into contact with. The x-men all fell silent as they surveyed the scene below them. It was a pitch-black night and quite cold. Two figures were visible in a tower, surrounded by hundreds of people whose intentions did not look friendly from the torches and stakes they were carrying. . "Good God I think we might be too late." The figures came into focus so well that they could see the expressions of despair on their faces. "The mob is probably made up of good people who are getting carried away. And, I might say, rightly so if those guys in the tower really are vampires." Shadowcat's tone was bitter as she remembered the unfortunate encounters the x-men had had with the vampire Dracula when he had attempted to make Storm his mate. "Fighting them wouldn't be right. Besides, their sheer numbers would overwhelm us." "How do you propose we get to them then?" Colossus questioned. "Could you teleport them, Kurt?"

Nightcrawler: "I guess so, but would they want to come?"

Rogue: This ain't gonna be easy. Fighting of a mob that we don't wanna hurt to rescue people who may not wanna be saved? Not my type a' fight.

Shadowcat: "It's now or never, those people are climbing the tower and the walls aren't that high."

Rogue: "Uh, Ah think that that particular option jus disappeared, guys."

Turning their attention back towards the mob scene below, everyone in the jet watched in horror as the vampires jumped off the tower in to the frenzy.

Colossus: "A fall from there couldn't kill a vampire, could it?"

Shadowcat: "Look, that wasn't a suicide attempt, they're trying to fight their way out!"

Rachel: "You sure that wasn't suicide? Looks to me like they know that they are going down, and want to do so fighting."

Nightcrawler: "You are right. And if we want to save them we will have to fight." The German born mutant sighed. He'd been hoping to rescue the target peacefully. So much for that idea. "Colossus, Rogue, and I will attempt to keep the targets relatively isolated. Kitty and Rachel, you try to persuade them to leave with us if you can. All right, now everybody out. I'll take Peter, the rest of you get down by yourselves."

Shadowcat: "'K boss."

Teleporting himself and Colossus into the fray, Nightcrawler couldn't help being frightened. A superstitious crowd like this was sure to believe him to be a demon. That, coupled with the fact that he was attempting to prevent their killing of the vampires, was sure to make them hate him.

Rogue and Rachel flew down while Shadowcat 'air-walked' beside them, leaving the jet to hover on autopilot. "Hey Rach, you want the hunky guy or the girl?" Kitty asked her companion. Calming those fighting devils down didn't look like an easy task. "Doesn't matter to me. But look, I think the guy is already done for." Rachel shuddered as she felt his psychic death screams before she could even attempt to calm him. She turned her telepathic talents to the girl.

They were too late. They already had Stephen, and they would have Driani too in a minute. She froze when they captured him. For just a second, before the stake came down, she remembered the last hundred years. All the good times they'd had, traveling all over Europe, Asia, and both Americas, learning new languages, setting up whole lives for themselves for years at a time, always leaving just before anyone caught on to the real reason they never looked older. Watching their beautiful estate age gracefully, playing pranks on unsuspecting villagers, the love they had shared, the petty fights they had, how he'd taught her everything he know, Driani remembered it all. Then one angry, uneducated peasant brought the stake down on his heart, and it was over. Five hundred years of youth and strength, and suddenly Stephen was nothing but ashes. She could feel it in her heart, a burning ache where his spirit used to be. Just like that she snapped. Going full on into her third form, Driani lunged herself at the peasant and before she even realized he was dead she was on the next one, and then the next. Her consciousness slowly retreated to mourn in the back of her head while her fighting instincts took over, despite the presence she felt in her mind that tried to calm her. What was that presence? It didn't seem like a threat at first, but before she knew it, the presence had stopped attempting to calm her and began to paralyze her. Well, if it wanted a fight it had gotten one. Driani psyche was every bit as strong as her body if not more so. Yet it discarded her best efforts as though they were nothing and began to take control. Her kicks and scratches grew weaker and weaker until she couldn't move at all. Just before she was nabbed by the mob, she felt herself floating in the air. 'This really is the end. That's good. I don't want to live without Stephen. Good bye world. ' And with that somber thought, she passed out.