Disclaimer: I don't own this…

Southampton, England 1669

Carlisle PoV

I sat in the shadows of buildings in the area just outside the docks and waited for the sun to set. "Hardly convenient." I murmured to myself, thinking of Southampton's sunny weather in the past week. A soft voice came from deeper within the alley, startling me. "You cannot trust the sun Carlisle, especially not here. There are many things you should not trust." Rebecca had followed me from our normal hiding place, hoping to knock some sense into me, to reason with me. I had not smiled in days, and by the message I was receiving from Rebecca and her friend, I was not fooling them at all.

"You are not happy. You will live for many years to come, yet you are unhappy waiting mere weeks to swim the English Channel. I know you are discovering things in our world slower than most Carlisle, but that does not mean that I will let you become a masochist. You have not killed a single soul on this world. That is something many cannot say." Rebecca continued, knowing as she always did that I would not interrupt. Rebecca and Frieda were acquaintances, perhaps friends in this lonely city. Yet what she said made some sense in the long run. I could not mope and wallow in self pity. She had been raised similar to how I had. A puritan from the age of two, work now and you will earn penance and forgiveness, so that you may enter the lord's kingdom later.

"Perhaps you are right. But you already knew that." Of course she did. She knew everything. The extra 'abilities' that these vampires had were astonishing at times. Rebecca was something called a 'Spirit guide', someone who knows the past, present and future for everyone and everything. It nearly drove her mad, but she didn't show it. Her skin was as white as mine, her build small, slender, almost fragile-looking for a vampire. The muscles on her body were hardly noticeable, though she was as strong as any normal vampire. She looked soft and curvy, which would probably have been pleasing to the eye. Perfectly proportioned, her face looked like an Italian painting, except her nose was more defined and less long, her eyes differently set. Rebecca's hair was sepia, with caramel and saffron streaked into it. She wore her hair in a braid down her back and skirts that came down to mid-shin. Rebecca had always worn three pointed hats and men's cotton shirts as a sign of rebellion, wearing leather corsets that laced at the front instead of the back. It was the oddest thing any vampire (or human for that matter) would ever hope to see.

At least Frieda, the willowy blonde haired creator of Rebecca had some sort of refinement. Yet the two of them unnerved me. "I'm making you nervous. I wish I knew how to make you calm." She stated simply as the light disappeared. I made a decision then and there, and Rebecca's head snapped up. "Newcastle, Carlisle? Really, there's a lot more to see and do here than there. Kent is a lot better this time of year, or you could continue on to Paris. Then you could go on to Spain, Greece, or maybe even Italy!" I could see the ideas sprouting up in her head as I sifted through my choice. I would go to Newcastle, then buy fare to Aberdeen. Rebecca had been kind to me during my short stay at Southampton. These last few months I would have broken down and lost my control over ten times had it not been for the girls. I sighed. A vampire at sixteen. I would give her some form of closure. Her parents had given her to a puritan missionary in Aberdeen when she was two. She didn't know why, only that she had been adopted by the missionary's cousin and raised in Southampton before her transformation. I would find the why and continue south.

Rebecca PoV

I never expected Carlisle to leave Southampton so soon. But then again I wasn't exactly focusing on the where. Only on the when. A slideshow of pictures danced in the back of my head, flicking from one to the next so fast that I had no idea which ones were real and which ones weren't. If vampires could get headaches, I'd have a grand one. I never understood how Frieda managed this inanely large mental capacity; Then again, she didn't have the annoying talent I did.

I could see Carlisle would have an extremely long, extremely happy life. He would have a family… Of a sort. I was never sure with Carlisle, he never did what vampires would do. Then again, neither did I, but it was understandable in my case. I got to see my prey's life, the fulfilling, amazing lives they could have had disappear from their future as I killed them. That was an experience that made me miserable. Besides, I was raised a respectable girl. What would my foster parents say if they knew I had killed.

Carlisle and I had met here in Southampton… Frieda had seen him first, but I had known he was coming. A sixth sense if you will. Watching Carlisle run away from the city… It brings the memory back.

He hadn't hunted in weeks, none of us had. We were in the caves, secluded outside the city because the mortals had become suspicious of our occupation here. I needed an alternate form of nourishment, we all did. Hunting in such a small city was dangerous, and we needed to stay. Frieda's creator was going to meet us there within the next year, and we had no idea when. I was too weak to focus on the when by the time Frieda asked me to.

Carlisle had come to us, scenting others in the area.

"Who are you and why are you hiding?" He called into the cave. We hauled ourselves to our feet, scowling at him as was natural. He had showed us a way to hunt that kept us inconspicuous and still allowed us to live in the city. I had never met anyone like him. He had a bit of a gloomy and masochistic air around him, and we had tried and succeeded (partially) to cure him of that. If Carlisle kept thinking like that he would never be happy. Never.

He had been so lonely we had taken pity on him and allowed him to stay. I had been lonely too, as Frieda did not provide much company. She rarely spoke, and when she did it wasn't intellectually stimulating in the least. Carlisle knew so much more than she did it was a constant thrill to have someone new around. I wish he could have stayed longer. I wanted to thank him for the journey he was taking up north. I knew he wouldn't find anything, but it was sweet none the less.