Disclaimer: Bite me.
The next two weeks went by painfully slow for Stella. As the full moon approached, she became more and more certain that her suspicion was fact. When she was called back to the Cardinal's office, she practically ran there. Three holograms awaited her along with a huge stack of papers. The men stood on either side of the desk, and Kate stood behind it.
Stella decided it was best to appear formal. "Good day, Cardinal Kate, King Virgil." She grinned. There was no way she was being formal with her brother. "Emperor Demetry."
"It's Leader Demetry, actually. Don't like that whole power thing." Demetry grinned at his sister's making his features appear boyish.
"What else have you found out?" Kate said abruptly.
Stella shook her head. "Nothing yet, except of course that both Terrans and Methuselah are victims in this."
"What?" Virgil asked, brow furrowing.
Stella nodded. "Last week we found a Methuselah dead. He had puncture marks all over his body."
Virgil looked uncomfortable, then said slowly, "you… you don't think that there could be more Titans out there, do you?"
Stella shook her head and unconsciously ran her tongue over her own small fangs. "No. That thought crossed my mind, but there is too much evidence that makes that theory highly improbable. Our teeth are completely round and smaller than the marks. Besides that, none of us would attack Terrans. Even if we did, our teeth were not designed to suck blood. We are specifically designed to kill quickly and effectively. The blood sucking process takes minutes, even hours, and the victim could still be left alive. No, the most probable solution is that these attacks range from child Methuselah to an entire different breed altogether."
Virgil nodded. Then his eyes became distant and his holographic head looked up. "I apologize, there seems to be a matter I must address. Over and out." His image flickered, and then went out.
Demetry sighed. "I'd better get going too. There hasn't been an hour when the old troops haven't stirred up trouble. It seems that the citizens have come to taking signs and rampaging the streets chanting 'we want Leader Demetry'." He chuckled. "quite endearing actually, but the guards that were loyal to the Emperor like to beat them to a bloody pulp." A sad look entered his eyes.
Stella reached to the back of her neck, where a scar still was from the day she had first met Father Nightroad. "I know how that is." She said quietly.
Demetry frowned and Stella remembered that she had not yet told him of her encounter. "What's wrong with your neck, Stella?"
"Um… nothing." Stella didn't think it was a good idea to tell Demetry about it. Though he was a joker, he still was overly protective of his little sister and would probably have every guard executed if he knew of what they had done to her.
Demetry didn't look convinced, but there was noting he could do as a hologram. "Fine. I'll talk to you guys later. Tell me if you find out what's going on."
"I will. You'll be the" Stella stopped to count, "seventh to know."
"Only the seventh? Seems to me you are making more friends tan I am."
"Yep, now go talk to your so called friends and save them from getting their buts kicked." Stella smiled as Demetry's hologram flickered out.
After bidding goodbye to the Cardinal, she walked back to the office with the sack of papers in her hands. She smiled to her lazy friends as she burst through the door. Leon took one look at the papers and began to complain.
"Aww, come on! We're supposed to be going out on missions, not doing all this paperwork."
"Yes, but this paperwork will lead to us going on a mission." Stella said, plopping some of the papers down in front of him.
"Not one I can go on." Whined Leon.
Stella thought about this. Leon wasn't strong enough to be allowed to go on a mission. Abel had explained to her that Leon was very much like his father in knowing how to things. He could pilot a plane, shoot a gun, and think about things that seemed improbable (though he didn't like to show it. Unfortunately, he lacked a few things like his speed, agility and endurance.
She ruffled his hair. "Tell you what, I'll help you with a few things, then you will be able to go on tougher missions."
Leon was still upset, but he turned to another subject. "Will you stop treating me like I'm a little kid!" he exclaimed.
Stella shrugged and smiled playfully. "Sorry kiddo, Father Nightroad and I both have a couple decades on you and Tres, no doubt, does as well."
Leon, seeing he was beat, muttered under his breath.
Seeing that it was almost time for her to go, Stella decided to leave the boys with a last few orders. "Um, let's see. Leon, I want you to go through the papers I showed you and graph fang length over the past two decades. Father Nightroad, you are going to graph the amount of murders over the past two decades. Father Tres, your assignment is a little bit harder. I would like you to find out how long a full body of blood can sustain one Methuselah. You might want to contact my brother for that."
"What are you going to do?" asked Abel.
"I'm going to find nail length, height, bone density and other tings about the Methuselah that might have changed." Stella said. She grabbed her coat off of her chair and slipped it on. "You guys, can you please have this done by Friday for me? It's important that we have it done at least two days before the full moon phases start."
Stella, unfortunately was not late, so she decided to linger a few minutes outside her apartment building, hoping to miss Mr. Onigoma. When the sky became overcast, and the first drops of rain started to fall, Stella had to go inside. She got up to her floor, when she brushed past Mr. Onigoma, and some of her papers caught on his clothes. The entire stack fell.
"Damn." Stella cursed as she stooped down to pick up the papers.
"Such language from a lady." Mr. Onigoma said, stooping down also.
"Who says I'm a lady?" Stella said, gathering up the papers before Mr. Onigoma could, but she missed one. She could see Mr. Onigoma reading over it.
"Vampire attacks? From twelve years ago?" He raised an eyebrow at Stella. "A little strange subject for a Terran, isn't it?"
Stella snatched the paper back. "I believe they prefer to be called Methusalah. And this is for work." Damn I should have brought a bag. What bag? Shut up.
She ran inside before he could say anything else, making a mental note to go buy a bag.
A/N: You know the deal. Review!