"Going on for another all nighter? You should rest sometime, Luce. We're lucky we finished early today, you should go with everyone else, enjoy a drink, have some fun."

"I'll be fine, William, not really losing much, not to mention I'll be done early tonight."

"You sure about that?"

"Yes, Will. I'm sure."

Dr. William M. a senior attending physician at the University of Chicago's Medical Center and the hospital's Residency Director tended to always worry about her. Lucy was the student with the brightest future after all, but sometimes it got to her and she would have to good naturedly scold him for over worrying for her. Not that he was soft, hell no, he was as stern as there was, but you could count on him when you were stuck on some unknown place, naked and stuck on a telephone booth (intern's true story).She waved him goodbye and craned her neck to make sure he was really gone before she placed down what she was doing and heading for a particular cabinet nobody used.

After taking out a nondescript duffle bag, she made her way to the back where the bodies that were still not identified pleasantly lied in the cold chambers. Peeking about inside and making sure the coast was clear, she placed the bag, along with her clipboard atop a surgeon table and pushed it towards a specific point in the mortuary freezer. She pulled it open and sighed at the body bag there, stretching her neck a bit. She still had Mr. Overfelt to attend to. So young, so fast, so dead, put your seatbelt on, kiddies. The body bag was unzipped and she turned towards the duffle, taking out several things from inside that would seem strange, if not odd; A pair of jeans, an old pair of sneakers, boxers, socks, a black shirt and a worn out white hoodie.

Now, in horror movies, this is around the time where the body ominously rises up and strangles (or eats, if you like zombie movies. She adored them) the poor unsuspecting woman. When she heard the groan, she wasn't startled at all, instead walking towards another of the freezers and pulling Overfelt out, checking his toe tag and making sure he was ready to be moved. He was going to have a nice funeral, she'd heard.

"Not even good morning?" The man croaked, voice raspy as if he hadn't spoken in ages. The cold does that to you.

"It doesn't count when your morning constitutes of seven pm, Desmond."She answered back with a sly smile and turned to see him giver her half a glare.

He looked like he'd come out of a horror movie, what with the blue tone on his lips, the gray tone of his skin and the almost emaciated appearance. She chuckled as he clumsily got out and began dressing himself.

"You're a real comedian, Luce."

"Learned from the best."

"I'm still not sure if that's a good thing." He smiled wryly and she smiled back.

"You hungry?" This was not a nice question, but she had to do it anyways.

"Not much. Let me get the feeling back to my toes and then we can talk about food."

She shook her head and looked skywards, almost exasperated. "You have the most obscure sense of humor, I swear, if you could, you'd joke about bursting into flames from sun exposure."

"Wanna hear a joke about it? It'll be hillarious too, just bang! We all fall down. Then, Count Desmond becomes this thin, charcoaly stick."

The blonde frowned at this as the scarred man chuckled. "Dad, not funny."

"Ouch, daughter card already? Alright, alright, I'll stop with the death jokes." He conceded, when the frown was followed by a glare. "How have you been Lucy? Sleeping better like I suggested or put on extra shifts like I told you not to do." Well, if she was gonna pull the daughter card, he might as well pull the parent card, right?

"I'm over twenty one, Desmond, your question is invalid." Yeah, no, not working here.

"Ah, touche. Not fair but well played."

It was strange, she mused. Maybe she was insane, had been since she was seven, taking care of this creature. He couldn't really be called human, not with his frightening nonchalance to the everyday violence, the sudden peaks of apathy. But at times, he would show such uncontained kindness, would protect a stranger, and it would make Lucy that maybe it was just her holding on to what tiny sparks of humanity still clinged to existance.

He sure as hell didn't look human right now, though. Gaunt, skin almost plastered to his bones, those horrid dark, purple bags under his eyes, the eerie way his actions were practically noiseless, like a predator. His eyes. They were their real shade, that sharp gold that reminded her of knives, scissors, needles, swords, anything sharp and cutting, but beautiful in its glinting dangerous way. She'd always joked he looked like some oversized, underfed eagle this way. With the clothes on, he looked comical, at least to her, what with them trying not to slide off of his bony hips.

"Are you at least going to tell me where you're headed this time?"

He only gave her that crooked smile he had on when food was involved and slinked out of the morgue. Another sigh, this time with fond exasperation.

Lucy Stillman was a busy woman. Her pathology internship tended to keep her busy and usually, more than 20 hours inside a freezing room full of dead bodies to which she had to discover when, how and why they had died. Of course, this was just standard job procedure, as her real goal was to study a disease she'd been (cursed, fortunate, terrified, grateful?) lucky enough to find. She still couldn't pinpoint some exact details and her extra shifts would sometimes deter her from her original research, but in time, maybe next year on her residency, she would be able to post her thesis and maybe, find a cure. She had to; she felt she owed the diseased at least that, for all he'd done for her, and maybe, she would allow him to finally rest from all the symptoms it carried with it.

Immortality becomes a pain in the ass after 800 years, if what her patient tells her is true.

How to begin with her patient? I mean, considering him to be one of the world's oldest walking, breathing history textbook. Hell, he could become World Heritage if he wasn't so jaded (and childish. How a man with an approximate life span of 839 years acted childish when the mood struck was beyond her. She preferred it over brooding, though) it's hard to give a good description, more so when he just tells bits and pieces.

Male, of, err, Arabic heritage? He'd mentioned something about the Third Crusades, a town then called Masyaf, hell, Genghis Khan but then he'd gone about Renaissance Italy. How do you make a jump from the early 1100's to the 1460's? I'm telling you, World Heritage icon (did I mention he was BFF with the Leonardo da Vinci?). Age on tentative 800 something, something years, clinically impossible but real, because she saw him every night, cross my heart, hope to die. Malady started after confirmed infection when he was twenty four (that's a fuckload of years by the way. Ugh, math, as if she didn't get enough of it), but patient refuses to explain exact matter of infection. Symptoms include… well, see this is the hard part. I mean, vampirism isn't something that affects everyone the same, or so she's been told. But then again, she only has two cases, and one of them is insane.

Regardless,she had atleast some concrete symptoms. Patient has extreme photosensitivity and sunburns, err, immediately (as in, literally. You know, burst into fucking flames, she's seen this on her Petri dish and she still can't figure out how). Light allergy to garlic, but patient confirms this has been since birth (she still remembers laughing herself stupid over this. He wasn't amused). Suffers from Lazarus phenomenon which has allowed subject to keep waking up day after day (after week, after month, after year, after century, etc), but remains in a catatonic almost dead state at daylight. Heart rate reduces to less than three beats per hour, brain activity ceases unless he forces himself to stay conscious, breathing becomes close to nil, appearance deteriorates, skin becomes blueish gray and body temperature drops to an unhealthy 82 °F. She's also confirmed a very strange group of chronic leukemia, which completely destroys the blood cells currently in his body, needing to replenish the equal nutrients, minerals and just general composition of it in less than one month (fancy words for he has to feed every once a month or he starts going downhill).

These are all pretty science words for 'Oh My Fucking God, I Found an Actual Vampire I Think I Just Shat Myself'. If she published a book, she'd win billions.

Desmond Miles, as he was calling himself now, was one of a kind indeed and she still couldn't believe that he'd agreed to let her study him and maybe, find a cure (he'd rolled his eyes at this and had joked that he would become dust if she cured him. She did not find it funny). She owed him as much, she always would. In the process she could maybe cure the other one too (they called him Sixteen. Even Desmond didn't know his name and it was bad considering they'd been stuck together since about 300 years ago).

Pathology had become her passion the moment she'd found out Desmond's… 'condition' might be a treatable ailment, but she was always warned not to keep her hopes up (she never listened). Her goal wasn't to repay back what he'd given her (not enough, trust me) but at the very least, allow Desmond and Sixteen to finally rest. Desmond would always compare it to walking in an eternal desert with tiny oasis spread apart, only to be violently devoured by sandstorms and she pitied them both for it, regardless of the more bestial factors of their sickness. That was the rest she wanted to provide, because the real rest Desmond always tended to search for was frightening.

Maybe one day she would find the cure. For now, she hid and took care of them as best as she could.

"So he was cute, and then?"

"I kissed him quiet. I thought he was gonna punch the old jaw out but he just blushed, said bye and staggered away."

Lucy laughed as she watched Desmond easily balance himself on the railing of the rafters. The old warehouse they used as a house (home, sweet home) was full of these, places the vampire could skitter about when it was still too early to call it a night and he was in no mood to be outside. He was in higher spirits than she'd seen him in years and this made her happy. He'd been moody lately, and it didn't help that Sixteen was going through a tantrum.

"Did you get his phone number? Facebook? Twitter? Email? Any way to get smoke signals to him? I heard that's pretty hardcore now a days."

"Oh, sure, make fun of the old guy. Nah, I know where goes about, his scent's real easy to pick up."

"Desmond, that's known in some places as stalking."

He laughed, taking a leap and vanishing from view. Ah, they were playing again. She kept her ears sharp and her breathing down. He'd taught her how, even how to move without a sound. What came naturally to him had taken her most of her life to learn. "Not really." His voice answered, although it didn't seem to have a direction in particular. "I mean, it's not like I'm going to follow him everywhere he goes."

"That sounds familiar." She felt the shift, the air moving behind her, no sound except for the prickling of her hair at the back of her neck. She spun and clicked her tongue when he caught her leg in his hand with a surprised face. "You should stop that. You're going to give someone a heart attack."

"I'm affronted that you were going to kick me. Doesn't your old man get any respect?"

She hit him in the shin for good measure.

There was a soft sound, a light clicking she could hear in the freezer. She made a face of disbelief and pulled Desmond out. He stared at her with guilt, the cellphone still in his hands.

"Texting? You were about to be found out because of texting? Centuries of silence, being the alpha male, stricking terror into the hearts of people and texting was going to be your downfall?"

"This is the first time I feal really naked, but to answer your question, I could always kill the witness." He smiled, albeit sheepish.

"Why didn't you tell me it was Shaun? When you said you found this cute British guy and you were actually going on a date, I didn't expect it to be Shaun. Of all the British in the world, you chose the one I know. I feel like that song."

He watched her rub her temples with an irritated frown. He couldn't help but smile. "Stacy's Mom?"

"Except it's Lucy's Dad."

He burst into laughter.

"I'm going to kill you if I have to call Shaun stepdad."

"We're not that close. Not yet."

She placed her hands on her hips as he merrily answered back whatever it was he was writting. She was crazy wasn't she? "But you want to."

"Yes."

"And does he want to?"

"He's been answering all my texts. I'm guessing yes. It's the scar I tell you, irresistble."

"Along with the accompanying stench of death. When was the last time you ate?"

He made a face. "Mooom, but I don't wanna eat my greens."

"That's not what I meant and you know it."

There was silence after that. It wasn't strange, just, well, it is odd to be talking to someone clinically considered to be a corpse and the only thing said corpse is doing is texting himself silly. The black body bag wasn't helping. They were having a silent glaring contest and for a moment, Lucy wanted to ask what was really bothering her, the real thing she was upset about, but she trusted Desmond. She'd ask him later. He'd been able to take care of her, so Shaun would be no problem, right?

She smirked "I'm not paying your bill."

He leered. "I'll stop paying yours."

"Oh, now that's low." She walked away, nose in the air as Desmond laughed and tried to make her stay. She couldn't help but smile in satisfaction when she heard him crash to the floor.

Sobbing. Soft and low, ondulating between high cries and low moans, interjected by pitiful crying and wild gibberish. Lucy watched as Desmond growled and grumbled in Arabic, fingers busy stitching Sixteen up. Two weeks ago, after an especially bad episode, he'd escaped and roamed about Chicago. The authorities kept calling them animal maulings, but Lucy knew it was Sixteen in a panic attack. Desmond had finally sprung to action when he'd received a text from Shaun telling him he'd seen a white blur outside of his apartment. No doubt Sixteen had gone there in search of Desmond, his scent rather prominent with his visits to the Brit.

"Did you have to be so harsh on him?"

Desmond glared, teeth becoming sharp as he bit the string and began with the other long laceration on Sixteen's back. It had been brutal, but with those horrible change of moods he had, it was the only way to keep her 'Uncle' in check.

"We let him be in the warehouse without any locks and the first thing he does is run away to look for me. Yes, it was necessary."

"You know he's almost glued to you."

"That's besides the point."

There was a high wail as, almost on purpose, the same fingers that were healing him dug to cause pain. Even now, Lucy didn't understand why Sixteen clinged so obsessively to Desmond if the other only hurt him. Then again, Sixteen hurt Desmond worse without even intedning to. Which was the worst of two evils, she'd never know.

"I-I-I'm so, sorry, I, I didn't... The moon, she... I'm so sorry, Desmond, I'm so, so sorry..."

They both frowned as Sixteen went on to his thirteenth round of apologies. He was so broken. She always wondered what had happened to make him into this sopping mess."It's alright." He murmured, going back to the task as the smaller murmured to himself, bandaged fingers touching his own mouth nervously, movements jittery. "But what you did was wrong. Weren't you supposed to stay and take care of Lucy?"

"L-Lu.. Lucy? I didn't, didn't take care. Lucy, is she, is she angry? She is... SHE IS! YOU ARE! DON'T YOU FUCKING TOUCH ME!"

Lucy ran our as quickly as she could. All she could do was get out and wait, because the only one who could calm him was Desmond. It was hours later that she watched as Desmond cleaned his hands, a long nasty gash across his stomach messing the hoodie and threatning to spill his guts out.

"Is he asleep or did you knock him out again?"

"Asleep, for once. He'll start screaming in an hour, mark my words."

Watching Desmond sit on the floor made her frown. He always did that when he was particularly tired, not to mention he was barefoot. Another bad sign. The hoodie went off and she was already sitting besides him with the medical kit always kept close. You never knew with Sixteen.

Sixteen suffered from... everything. Paranoia, schizophrenia, bipolarity, anxiety, psychosis, depression, stress, all mixed into a cocktail and forced into the younger man's bloodstream, just to see what would happen, just how fucked up and broken he could come out. These wounds, the chuck of flesh missing from Desmond's neck, the cut on his forehead that kept his left eye closed, the jarring open wound on his stomach that barely contained his intestines, his old scar open until it met his cheekbone, the cuts, the bruises littered about, all of these and so much more, all signs of his sickness.

Effects may vary.

"He didn't mean to. You know he didn't." That was the worst part.

"He never does." That was the sad part.

"Shaun and Desmond sitting on a tree!"

"K-K-K-K. I. S. S I, I, I. N. G."

"You too? Since when is it fair to pair up against me?"

Lucy hummed and looked down where Sixteen sat, rocking himself softly and clutching to her legs like a small child would. In a few hours, she would have to take him to the warehouse and put him in the big metal freezer so he could go to sleep, just like Desmond was about to do.

"My ear hurts because of you. Becca didn't think it was funny that you were hussling in her room."

"What's, what, what is huss... hussling?"

The blonde smiled at her uncle. Sometimes he could be so naïve.

"We'll tell you when you're older."

"How about we don't tell him at all? You know, keep the moral value nice and on top?"

There was a small noise, a vibration and she stared in disbelief as he took out from besides him a cellphone. He smiled warmly, although that changed when she took it from his hands. Worse off, she pocketed it.

"Hey! That's mine! C'mon, Luce, cut me some slack!"

"No way in hell, go to sleep already. I had to lie out of my ass that it might have been somebody's phone. If you don't want me telling it's post-mortem gases, let me zip you up already so I can get some sleep myself."

"T-T-The bloat stage provides the first clear visual sign that, that microbial proliferation is underway. In this stage, anaerobic metabolism takes place, leading to the accumulation of gases, such as hydro-hydrogen su-sulphide,ca-carbon dioxide, and methane. The accumulation of gases within the, with the, within bodily cavity causes the distention of the abdomen and gives a cadaver its overall bloated appearance. R-R-Right?"

She smiled and passed a hand through the wild mop of hair. Sometimes, these little moments made everything worth it. Sixteen nice and calm, Desmond without a worry, herself not as stressed. This right here was why she was trying to cure them.

"That's right."

"You owe him a cookie. "

She glared at the man smiling, sitting inside a bag for a cadaver. Oh, the irony of it all. "Oh, go to sleep you!"

The body bag was zipped back up, even as he laid down with laughter. She pushed the freezer back in and heard no more noises, only Sixteen murmuring to himself, smiling.

A/N: Right on time! UPDATED : Added some things, thanks to Alexa for pointing out t he mistake, I was exhausted though when I finished this and had no time to check xD I think I just lost my readers...