The beginning was stupid, really. You know how in movies everything always slowly builds up to a climax? Usually, you also hear some crescending dramatic music to add an additional clue that something serious is about to happen. In reality, the most violent and shocking events are so shocking, exactly because they come unannounced. One moment, you see a good friend across the street, and the next moment you're killed by a truck because you neglected to look around before you cross the street. In my case, one moment I was taking an evening stroll as a tourist in Prague, and the next moment, I was the bewildered spectator of a very messy fight, caught in the cross-fire between lycans and vampires.
Of course, I was not familiar with the terms, back then. All I saw was a bunch of people in fancy black-and-white evening dresses, and horrible, horrible beasts with bloodcurdling howls and inch-long claws. The fancy dressers were armed with impressive-looking sub-machine guns, but these beasts were so strong and fast, they could tear down a solid wall with a single bash of their arms -- or paws.
I was far too scared to follow anything of the battle, and I literally tried to melt into the wall of a dark corner. Suddenly, dust and brick showered over me, and I covered my head to shield my eyes against the dust. I remember some shrieks and howls, a series of loud cracks that I now know to be bones shattering, and a dead vampire fell right in front of me, body and face both impossibly twisted and contorted. One of his eyes seemed to stare right at me, and he seemed very pissed off that I hadn't done anything to help him. It must have taken a while for me to shake off the paralysis, but eventually I crawled towards the dead body, pried the gun from his lifeless fingers, and then scampered back to what I considered a safe corner. Now, having gained some more experience, I wouldn't be caught dead in a corner anymore. Literally.
Anyway, she must have spotted me when I had left my dark corner for the gun, because a few seconds later, she jumped down from somewhere higher on the building, and even as the leather boots made heavy contact with the soil, she veered up smoothly and walked straight to my hide-out. I may have been scared and I certainly lacked any real battle experience, but I did know how to handle a gun, so in one smooth movement I cocked the gun and had the muzzle trained on her chest.
I couldn't help but notice how beautiful she was, but it was definitely a predatory beauty, and when she flashed a brief, barely amused smile to me, I was far from reassured by the sight of her fangs. She had thick brown half-long hair, and she was dressed entirely in black leather. Even then, I could see differences in dressing style among the dressers. There were people who were literally in evening dress, a costume or a long gown, while the woman in front of me took the "dress to kill" adagio obviously very literally. There was something decidedly ... combative ... in the thick, unyielding leather jacket that acted as armor, the heavy leather boots and of course the two modified berreta's she held in her hands. I held the submachine gun a little higher, both for myself to make sure it was aimed correctly, and for her to see the gun more clearly.
"It won't do much against me", she commented off-handedly. Now that I know her by reputation as well as by name, I'm amazed she didn't just put me down with a single bullet of hers. Instead, she casually shifted position and looked around briefly, to make sure she wasn't missing a vital part of the action.
"We use those against the lyc.. those beasts. They won't stop.. one of us." Even though she was obviously trying to explain the situation and avoiding any terms that might confuse me, none of her comments made any sense to me. I just stood there, confused and scared, and I slowly shifted to a more comfortable position so that I could keep the gun trained at her. And that's when another one of those sudden, dramatic and unannounced events unfolded.
I remember her eyes shifting into focus on something else than me, and both her arms swung up to bring the beretta's in line with her eyes. Outside of my conscious will, my reflexes reacted to the sight of the guns raising, ordering my fingers to squeeze off a round of bullets. The next moment, I was swept sideways by something big, strong and snarling. There was a fight where several lycans tangled with several vampires, and I was tossed around like a man overboard during a sea storm. I remember being bitten, falling into a sewer hole, and the fight rolled past the hole, further down the street. That was my luck, because if any of the clans had noticed the blood in my neck, none of them would have taken any risks and I wouldn't have survived that fateful night.
Later that night when I gained consciousness again, my body was already shaking and my head throbbing like I was a crack junk who hadn't scored for an eternity. Although I didn't know it back than, I was experiencing my transformation, and there was nobody around to help me or even just tell me what was going on. It was a terrible experience that I do not wish to undergo again, but still I consider that night to be one of the luckiest of my life. I have -quite literally- tumbled into a whole new world, and I feel more alive for it.