"Should have known you'd be the one to lead me right to her." Was the only warning Cal had over the soft rustling of the discarded trash bag she'd just tossed into the dumpster for disposal. "So, I guess I should say thank you, for saving me the trouble." Was added almost as an afterthought aside from the hard pressing of the knife against her throat from behind

The first wound was surprisingly shallow given the sideways caught look of burning fury in her attacker's eyes after Cal had attempted to break Elinor's hold at her neck. Intended more for the initial pain rather than the prolonged sting of it.

"Miss me?" the blonde had asked as Cal gave a pained hiss at another slash towards her shoulder reopening the clawed scars 'Smashley' had gifted her before the zombie had become Cal's first unofficial, official monster kill as the two grappled with the weapon.

"Truthfully?" Cal coughed around the pain of her newly gained injuries after finally succeeding in twisting away from the knife-wielding vampire.

"Of course not," The shockingly underdressed and makeup-less vampire said her blade hand lashing out quicker than a cobra strike for another shallow slash to Cal's arm as she attempted to block a thought of a stab to her chest as they circled one another in the too close alleyway.

"Just to be clear here." The escaped vampire tisks making a sudden sweeping kick to take out Cal's legs in her growing fatigue against the well-fed vampire sending the hunter sprawling onto the darkened pavement. "the only reason I'm letting you live," Elinor says pressing her heel into Cal's chest with enough heft to drive the breath from the downed teenager's lungs keeping her trapped for the moment. "you, hunter girl are my best chance of getting my brat of a sister back."

"Don't you think I've tried already?" Cal asked hating the way her voice broke in defeat at the confession.

"Have you tried hard enough?" Elinor pressed, "what's the point of making her watch me kill you if she isn't hopelessly infatuated with you enough to feel anything when you die?" The blonde huffed as Cal's bloodied hands clawed at the foot digging into her chest.

Not that Elinor had let her lay there long before she was being drug by her ankle farther into the alleyway than needed if the blonde's intention was just to drain her blood, then dump her body in the already waiting dumpster.

"Just a test." Elinor had shrugged off at the unasked question fluttering behind the sting of held back tears at the pain of the attack as she'd knelt for a few lingering seconds over Cal's downed figure as the blade was removed.

Elinor's outline over her pausing for a few seconds in contemplation before bringing the blood-slicked knife to her lips to slick away some of the sticky red coating the blade with an oddly curious expression.

Cal couldn't hide her proud snicker through the overwhelming pain when Elinor's curiosity quickly turned to stomach-turning disgust at the taste of her blood.

"Gah," Juliette's older sister gagged quickly spitting what she could of Cal's blood from her mouth. "like soured milk." She moaned in revulsion "Trust Sweet Little to taint your blood for any but herself." She says as if in some kind of explanation as she keeps trying to clean away the bittered taste of Cal's blood from her tongue.

Then her head had tilted much like a dog when they were listening to something only, they could hear before a sickeningly pained smile crossed her lips. "Look at that, You might not think she cares but she's already on her way down just to check on you. Seriously even like this the two of you are sickeningly sweet."

Cal could only cough in pain attempting to slow the seeping blood staining her shirt from the slash wounds.

"Let's give her something to really worry about, shall we?" then came the hard stabbing of the blade into the teenager's midsection. "For breaking my little sister's heart." Elinor had said as her sneaker clade heel had stomped down hard against Cal's covering hands as well as the already bleeding gash to the girl's stomach triggering a pained cry from the wounded teenager.

"Cal!?"

Cal hates how her heart flipped in her chest at the honest worry coloring the asking of her name as the ally door was shoved aside ushering an out-of-breath Ashley into the darkening side street.

Of course, Elinor would already be gone by the time Ashley had barreled through the side door into the alleyway. "Cal?" she'd called again considering that of course at first, she hadn't immediately spotted the wounded taller girl lying curled on the dirty pathway further down the ally.

The bleeding hunter couldn't even muster the strength to call back over the freshly throbbing pain in her stomach.

"Oh, God. Cal."

She'd found her.

Just like she'd done when Clayton Cook had been threatening to hand her over to the Guild.

"God just-just keep pressure on it." Ashley says her voice panicking now as she crouches over her muttering under her breath about how the one time, she forgets her phone, and it's now.

"That Elinor. Really nasty piece of work." Cal coughed her hand joining Ashley's returned ones in pressing even more against the bloodied mess that had become the hunter's stomach.

"This is the last time I let you take out the trash by yourself. Didn't I warn you about how dangerous it is around here at night?" her ex scolds, panic layering her pouted anger. Until Ashley had remembered an installed call box wired beside the apartment's side door initially intended for any extra late, late-night deliveries any of the building occupants might make but bleeders couldn't be choosers.

"I'll be right back Cal, okay? I'm going to get help."

Cal had tried to hold her back, but her fingers were too slick with her own blood to have any kind of grip as Juliette had rushed back to slam her elbow into the thing as smoothly as she'd smashed into the side door to the school the time, they'd needed a place to lay low for the night following the disaster of the Guild's raid on the Fairmont house.

"Hey, hey. Stay with me, Cal. Okay. Stay with me." She coaxed, seeing a glassier glaze clouding the other woman's eyes as she struggled to focus with how uncooperative her fading consciousness.

"I'm sorry." Cal gasped through the pain. "For…for everything."

"Hey, I'm the one that kissed you back, alright," Ashley says not understanding the source of the other girl's guilt. "I'll let you kiss me any time you want just stay with me, okay?" she bargains.

"Promise?" Cal coughed in a laugh.

"Forever." Ashley answers before Cal loses the battle against the darkness of unconsciousness.