A/N: Do not worry, little lost lambs. I'm still writing.
Great Edit of December 2011: I realized I might have presented goths in the wrong light – I forgot to really rub in how much the guy wasn't really a goth. I don't want to piss off people who may be my main readers. Now you know – and knowing is half the battle.

Chapter 12: Eulogy

Something came over me. Whatever I'd have felt if I wasn't drunk on my own power, I was blind to now.

But still, I understood myself. I wouldn't become afraid of my power. I'd just resolved I wouldn't cower. I almost couldn't fathom it. I had power far beyond anything in the human world, and this time I was free to use it. If Aro's plan was to scare us into submission, he wouldn't use force. The Aro I knew was too intelligent to ruin a well-planned trap.
But no matter how excited I was, I couldn't just vault into my new world without a thought. If I drew too much attention to myself, maybe even my family would be forced to turn against me, and internal fighting was the last thing we needed. I walked along the street for a while, looking for a place to rest and get my mind together. I decided on an overgrown park slightly off the main streets, seating myself on a weathered stone bench amidst a thorny mess of bushes and trees.
First, the time. I had to face that if I didn't get inside behind walls or blackout curtains before dawn, I'd quite simply burn up. It had been about one and a half hours since I'd went out the door, which I was pretty sure had been at about nine in the evening. That meant it was about half past ten now. Plenty of time, and just in time for the nightlife. That'd probably be my life from now.
Even though the pun was pretty lame, it had some truth in it and lent a bit of realism to the situation. I'd never really been to a nightclub before, seeing as I hadn't ever gotten old enough. Still, it was a good place to ...feed. I knew that was the common word, but it still felt a tad too inhuman, like humans were just food. I knew better. I'd been alive until about a year ago, and even though I knew I was more than just a dead girl walking around, it didn't do much to help the burning thirst in my throat. Thinking about it only made it worse, as always.
I lurched to my feet in a movement I knew didn't look human at all, determined to sate the beast in me before it took over. First, I needed not to look out of place. A small thing, but I had a feeling it would come in handy if I didn't want to attack anyone for sustenance.
I didn't have the self-control to walk past hordes of people to find a place I'd fit perfectly in, so I just cast a quick glance over the nearest place a hundred feet or so down the street from the park. A lot of people in black clothes, standing in groups in the alley outside the club, smoking and talking. There wasn't really time to fix the clothes, so I just decided to buy some cigarettes. To me, things that worked through the human organism were the clearest signs of life.
I held my breath as I walked through the crowd to get to a kiosk on the other side, where I grabbed a lighter and the first pack I saw and gave the cashier the money, a far less thrilling experience than I'd expected as a rebellious teenager.
When I got outside, I opened the pack, let a smoke dangle in the corner of my mouth and lit up, filling my mouth with a choking, thick taste I'd known from the time five years or so ago, when my dad was still smoking. I purposely caught my reflection in a puddle and smiled when I saw how well the clothes and cigarette let me play the role of bad girl. I walked a bit into the alley, where I couldn't be seen from the street, leaned up against the wall beside the club's back entrance and laughed inwardly when a man came over to me in a matter of seconds.
He was quite pale, with long, back-combed black hair and clothes with quite a surplus of buckles. His watery blue eyes peered unblinkingly at me from above his wide grin, and as he came closer, I realized he was probably just looking for someone who'd sleep with him despite his greasy, sallow complexion and unsettling demeanor. There really wasn't a hint of honesty about him, and I wondered inwardly how he could even think I'd believe him.
"So, are ya new to the scene, or what?" His small, pearly eyes were still firmly fixed on my face, only rarely blinking. "Nah. I don't really know what scene this is, to be honest. I only just came to town." Talking in such a relaxed way seemed to make him even more excited. Just the better, as that meant I could avoid attacking him.
"The goth scene, o' course. The night scene. You one o' us, or jus' wanna be one?"
Regardless of what scene it was, he was clearly a worse example. That meant I wouldn't be as ashamed.
"Yeah... I was kinda lookin' for excitement. Somethin' new, ya know? Jus' got outta my smalltown."
His smug, fast-talking language was easy to imitate, so I decided to practice when I had the opportunity. "I can give ya excitement, baby. Jus' follow me, I know a good spot for th' fast life."
His smile betrayed his intentions, but I decided to act my part and play with him. "Thank ya. So where is it?"
There. I had him. "Jus' over here, dahlin'. It's a club jus' around th' corner." I followed him around the corner of the rain-drenched alley, waiting to strike when we got a bit out of sight. But just when we got around the corner, he shoved me up against the wall. Unprepared as I was, I couldn't resist, and adrenaline welled up in me together with wild anger, like a cornered animal.
"Don't." The word came out of my mouth in a feral snarl I couldn't even recognize, and for a moment I saw his eyes widen. Then the sneer came back on his face, and my instincts flared up again, out of control. I'd meant to push him away and make a run for it, but I wasn't used to my strength.
My loosely clenched fist went through his chest with a crunching sound, so fast that I thankfully couldn't feel his ribs giving in. Just for a moment, his mouth opened in shock, and then I sunk my teeth into his neck just to avoid seeing his eyes.
Pleasure flowed through me as I drank in what was left of him, but as I stood there afterwards, with blood on my arm and face and the corpse of my would-be rapist at my feet, I was struck by the realization that I'd kind of enjoyed it all.