The Reunion I Never Wanted

He smiles at me menacingly, "Nice to see you again Matt."
I growl as he says my name in disgust, "I'd say it's nice to see you again, but I don't even know your name."

"Of course you do, just as I know yours. Come on dude we were only best friends for how many years?"

"Steve," I whisper and from the corner of my eye I see Dylan strain to hear what I said.

"Much better, but don't go around saying that. I tend to keep that name under wraps, but saying that that is the name you knew me as I think it's only justice that I use it."
"I said your name so it's only fair that I know yours," I reason.

This seems to amuse him, "Oh Matt, since when have I ever played fairly."

"Saying that you are a vampaneze you probably should," Dylan interjects and I glare at his stupidity. "At least that's what Vancha told us."

I bite my tongue to keep from pointing out that he also has broken many other rules such as using vampets, but I don't think it's really going to help us. Steve turns his attention to Dylan and starts stalking towards him. Instinct kicks in and I also leap towards Dylan, but in a protective manner. This doesn't go over to well with Steve who then snaps his fingers; Dylan screams as he is thrown through the air to the other side of the room, hitting a wall in the process.

My face contorts into a snarl and with my fingers out I slash Steve in the arm with my nails. Thankfully he doesn't see it coming and as he gasps in pain I run over to the other side of the room to make sure my friend is okay. He is and I start running out of the classroom to draw the fight away from Dylan.

Steve seems to figure out what I'm doing however and gets to the door faster than I do; pushing hard enough to send me flying to the window. He smirks and I pause for a second. This guy is obviously too smart for the few tricks I have up my sleeve. I get that once I was some war general, scratch that prince I was never a general, I think; anyway I should know some ways to get away from this guy or to win, but nothing comes to me.

As much as I would love to get rid of these intrusive memories and be myself again, it would be nice to have them so I could get out of this classroom alive.

What's confusing me though is that Steve isn't trying to kill me. He's trying to roughhouse me, a lot, but none of his blows have even had a fatal intent. Knowing that I'm wanted alive scares the hell out of me. I don't know what exactly they want to do with me, but any scenario I can come up with is not pretty at all.

I see Steve stalking towards me as if I were his prey, and I guess I was. But then again he shouldn't underestimate me. Looking at his eyes I can tell he thinks I'm down and too weak to fight, he's wrong though. I raise my hand up and the beakers crash over his head. Probably not effective, but he looks stunned enough that I gain the upper hand.

Running at an inhuman speed, I get over to the other side of the room where Steve is and punch him in the face so hard that he falls over. Not letting this lull me into false precaution, I take my hand and slash him with my nails. Blood trails down his torso and the smell hits me. Only it isn't that ambrosia of when Sam's blood hit my nose, this is nasty in a way and not in another.

Either way it doesn't distract me, I was a little worried about that for a second saying that I'm apparently a blood sucking monster and all though. Steve stands up and smirks at me before lunging forward and landing a kick in my gut. Groaning from the pain, I crouch over. He takes advantage of this and hits me over and over again until I fall down from the excruciating pain.

This seems to amuse Steve and he glares at me; the type of look that eats at your very soul. But this does more than just eat at my soul, it eats at me. I feel my flesh getting torn from my bones and my blood begins to boil. It takes everything I have not to give him the satisfaction of hearing my screams.

For the first time though, I see how we are so different from the rest of our races. Each of us has such a vast amount of power running through our veins. So much that right now as I'm thinking about it I can almost feel it wanting to escape my pores; but that could just be the pain talking. There really isn't anyone else like us. And if either of us were fighting a normal vampire/vampaneze or even a human the fight would be nonexistent. It would be too easy to kill someone without even trying.

Fighting each other is a different story all together. We have a history together, even if I cannot remember it, we have these vendettas towards one another that I also can't remember, we have hundreds of people telling us to hate each other, at least I imagine, and destiny is pitting us against each other. I don't remember most of that though, I don't know anything and can only speculate. What I do know though is that for some reason we have power that wants to destroy one another.

And at the moment there is no doubt in my mind that Steve is way more adept at his abilities than I am and seems to possess a lot more power.

Steve laughs at me and pulls a dagger out of thin air. I close my eyes and gulp, readying myself for the shard pain of the dagger, readying myself to die. But the pain never comes. Instead I open my eyes and gasp at the sight of a shadow man covering me and fighting against Steve. Something clicks inside of me and I snap, the shadow man bows to me and stops fighting Steve before holding on to him.

He shivers in fear and looks at me with fake bravado, "Always on the defensive aren't you Matt?"

"Oh Steve you're right," I snort sardonically. "You are more powerful than me, more powerful and at my mercy." I walk over to him and lean towards his ear before whispering, "But you seem to forget that it is not you, but I who am the Lord of the Shadows. And um I think that gives me a bit of edge over you."

The next thing I remember is coughing up my lungs and lying on a pew in the abandoned church. Harkat, Vancha, and Dylan are standing over me, blabbering away on the state of my condition. Arguing right now that something must be wrong because of how inhuman my eyes are at the moment. I calm myself down, but I don't feel them become emerald again.

"He's awake," I hear Vancha smile. "I can't leave you alone for one second can I your highness?"

I snort at what feels like a familiar jab and chuckle, immediately regretting it as my side begins to ache. Harkat shakes his head at me, "Try not to move Matt."

"I'm fine," I tell them and sit up slowly, groaning in the process and my eyes fall to Dylan. "You okay?"

He just rolls his eyes at me, "I'll live. Apparently I have a broken rib and arm and can't wrestle for a month, but I will anyway. There is no way Sam is going to beat me because I'm helping save the world."

Of course he'd still want to beat Sam and risk greater injury. His statement doesn't surprise me in the least. "Whatever Dyl, keep saying that when you're getting slammed to the ground and your ribs are sat on by some fat guy."

"Are you calling Sam fat or me weak? Because if it's the first then i agree Sam needs to lay off the ice cream and if it's the second then HEY!"

We laugh and Harkat shakes his head at us while Vancha just stands there confused. He clears his throat, "As much as I find your human antics funny, we have bigger issues at hand. Matt what do you remember?"
I think about it for a second, "We were in the classroom waiting for you and Steve showed up. We bickered and fought. He was winning and there was a dagger about to stab me in the chest, the rest of the fight is fuzzy and all I know is that somehow I won and then woke up here. He's wickedly strong though and I don't want to run into him anytime soon."

Dylan looks at me confused, "Wait so you don't remember what happened?"

"That is what I just said."

"Well I saw the entire thing and you were about to die when suddenly that dude was pushed back and then you whispered something in his ear, but I couldn't hear it. The only word I got was shadows."

Vancha gulps as if reliving a bad memory, "Lord of the Shadows."

"What?" I ask him, but he just shakes his head.

"Before you died you gained a title, lord of the shadows, and that is all I have to say on the subject."

His voice shows how serious he is and I get the sense that I don't want to provoke him. "This means war doesn't it?"

The two nod at me and Dylan's face pales. "There's has been war for years," Harkat sighs. "It's nothing new."

I stand up and start to walk around, only to fall over in the process. Everyone laughs at me and I feel my eyes brighten even more as I stand up. "Not funny guys. Do you know what's wrong with me?"

Vancha answers me, "Broken ribs, concussion, sprained leg, broken foot, and a messed up arm. Like that time in the city when you had your fight with hook guy, not that was bad."

Harkat laughs, "Or that time with the burns, that was probably the worse. Hell all the trials hurt you pretty bad."

I had a dream about that, which did seem as if it was a little painful. "That wasn't me, it was someone who you want me to be."

"Harkat did say you were doing this. Matt it is you we are talking about, jut you in a past life."

"No, it isn't me," I argue. "I don't know anything, I'm not a hero like this other guy."

"Dude, you kind of looked badass to me," Dylan points out and immediately shuts up as soon as I turn to glare at him."

I sigh, "Let's just not have this argument right now. What the hell am I supposed to do about this," I gesture to my body. "I have to get home and see my family. They'll ask way too many questions if I come home looking as if I just got beat up."

"Which you did," Dylan says and I glare at him again. I guess the whole sucking our friend's blood thing isn't bothering him anymore."

This isn't going to end well however you look at it. There's no way I can go home like this and there is no way I can't show up at home. Dylan would let me lie and say I'm at his house, but my parents freak at me sleeping out on school nights. If I went home I can just see my mom's face. I've already ended up in the hospital once this year for the whole fighting thing, if she sees me now there is no way she won't press charges on the school, and that is something I cannot deal with right now.

Of course there's also the whole her grounding my ass for life thing too…

I'll worry about that later though, for now maybe I should worry about being able to move. I hop over to the pew and sit down. Harkat comes over and splints my leg and my wrist. Apparently he worked on my ribs while I was out of it. He also hands me a pair of crutches and even though they're a pain, I can actually move.

Suddenly struck with an idea I bid Harkat and Vancha farewell, promising them that I'd be back in about an hour or two and make my way outside with Dylan. He's rambling the entire way about how awesome I was fighting Steve and how I had to teach him how to do some of that. I however do not share his enthusiasm and just nod along and put in a few words here and there.

Eventually we go our separate ways and I take a deep breath as I walk into my house. I close my eyes, hoping I can get away without Mom and Dad seeing the inhuman color in them since as hard as I try I can't get them to go back to normal. I walk into the kitchen and grab a snack before going into the living room where I see Mom cleaning.

Well this was it, "Hey Mom."

"Oh hi honey, how was your day?"

She doesn't look at me, a good thing so far. "Um okay I guess, I met a new friend today," I laugh at the irony of that.

"That's nice sweetie. Can you go clean your room?"

"Sure, but um can I maybe sleep at Dylan's tonight? We have to finish a project and it will take us most of the night."

Shit, she's turning to look at me. "Matt, you know how I feel about…" she trails off and screams.

"Don't worry, it's fine."

"What's wrong with your eyes? And how did you get hurt?"

Instead of answering her I just stare into her eyes until I feel her mind melt into mine, "You will let me sleep at Dylan's tonight and will not call his Mom to make sure everything is okay. Understood?" She nods and I continue, "You will also not remember the state you saw me in today."

With that I walk upstairs to grab a change of clothes and make my way back outside. Once safely away I release Mom and make my way to the church to meet up with Vancha and Harkat.

During the walk guilt starts to get the best of me. I just controlled my Mom's mind. If I did that to my Mom what's going to stop me from doing it to anyone? A huge part of my humanity disappears and by now I feel so nonhuman that I don't even know if I can call myself one. Humans don't suck blood, humans don't have preternatural abilities, humans aren't monsters like me.

By the time I'm at the church my head hurts from all the heavy thinking and guilt. My body hurts from walking so much and all I want to do is sit down. Vancha sees my struggle and helps me over to the bench to sit down. He also hands me a bowl of soup and I nod in thanks.

"I dealt with my family, they won't bother me tonight."

"You know Matt as much as I hate to say anything, it might be a good idea to get away from there for good."

I growl at him and the wind starts to pick up, making everything fly around. Lightning and thunder strike. "How dare you suggest such a thing! They're my family and I am not leaving them no matter what."

"Calm down, it was just a suggestion to keep them safe. Vampaneze will target them. Not to mention the fact that humans can't handle tempers as bad and destructive as yours."

Okay, so maybe he has a point. The small storm stops and Vancha laughs, "You my friend are quite hilarious. Now let's go hunting, it will help your injuries heal and might just get rid of your eye problems."

Wait hunt? As in hunt humans? I'm screwed.