Thud.

Screams. And a gabble of voices.

Makoto's felt tingling shock run along her limbs as her mind tried to calculate this turn of events. Why would a vampire want this to happen? Didn't they want to eat people? But force a girl to fall from a roof? What was the point? It didn't make sense! Makoto turned towards Amamiya. He was looking at her.

"Why?"

Before he could answer, a frantic female voice yelled out, "She's alive! Get help! Someone help!"

She lived? Makoto's eyes traveled to the roof of the school. Well, perhaps that wasn't that high.

Amamiya's eyes settled on Makoto's. "If she lives, she certainly needs a physician. Those people. They will leave her where she fell and call a priest. She will die."

He was right. People did not trust physicians. Physicians carried the taboo of the corpses they studied. People trusted prayer. Holy power defeated the vampires, it is said, so it was believed to conquer sickness and injury. Though Makoto always wondered why there were always so many funerals in churchyards if that were the case.

Makoto remembered Tae Takemi, the physician she just met earlier today. Her clinic could not be far- back somewhere near Cafe Leblanc. That was do-able. Yes! She could move the girl to the clinic. That would be useful!

Or should she bring the physician here? No, that would double the travel time. They might not have any extra time. They should probably take the Shiho girl with them.

"Let's take her to a physician, then," she said to Amamiya. She would do this. This was something she could do. She could be useful now to this Shiho girl.

"I cannot enter there. They will not allow me to take her. I must remain here. You must collect her yourself."

Makoto felt anger simmer towards Amamiya. His face was impassive. Did he even care a girl was dying over there? Then her mind caught up with what he was saying. A dhampir taking away a wounded girl? Maybe he was right. Maybe they would think he was trying to steal her away before the priest could arrive. That could go very badly, and Shiho would be forgotten in the chaos.

"Use your name," said Amamiya. "It is powerful, is it not?"

Makoto was unsure what he meant, but she nodded and turned from him, running towards the school gate. She entered through the man-door and faced a moderate sized circle of people- all heads looking toward the center and down. Fucking gawkers! Why wasn't anyone doing anything?

Makoto gritted her teeth and pushed into them, violently shoving students and adults aside, no few people yelping from the feel of her spiked armor. Served them right. Makoto made her way to the center where Sakamoto Ann was cradling a bloody and limp Shiho while Sakamoto Ryuji hovered nearby, clearly unsure of what to do.

Makoto stared at Shiho. Well, she was here. Now how to move Shiho safely to the physician? For the second time today, Makoto found herself in the middle of something with no plan. Let's see. Think. Think. How to move the girl. What did Makoto have access to that could move?

Her motorcycle wouldn't work. Neither would Amamiya's horse. When Makoto broke her arm as a little girl, she had to keep it very still and flat. Shiho probably broke more than that, but keeping her still and flat was still probably the best option. So what else was nearby?

Makoto was a student here not long ago! Think! Think! How to move things in and out of the school!

Oh! The cart! The two-wheeled cart the school used for various small loads. But did they keep it in the shack, still? Makoto jumped slightly to see over the surrounding people. The shack was gone. It must have been replaced since she was a student. She would need a current student. Makoto's eyes went to Sakamoto Ann.

Ann would work, and her crying and hugging Shiho probably wasn't the best thing right now anyway.

"Ms. Sakamoto!" Makoto said loudly.

Ann continued to cry and shake her head.

"Ms. Sakamoto!"

"Hey! Ann!" said Ryuji, trying to get his sister's attention, too. He shook Ann's shoulders.

Ann was oblivious to them. She needed to wake up! Makoto knelt down and grabbed Ann by her shirt, and pulled her forward. Ann's eyes opened slightly. Makoto slapped her across the face.

Ann's eyes sprung wide open. Her sobbing continued, but her eyes focused on Makoto.

"We can try to save her!"

"We can?!"

"Yes! But we need the school cart. Do you know where it is?"

"Yes. But- but the horses don't stay here. They are in the stables near the gate."

Damn! Well, Amamiya had a horse. He couldn't come in here, but his horse sure could.

"Can you ride a horse, Ms. Sakamoto?"

"Yes."

"Go out the gate. Go to Mr. Amamiya. The black-hatted man, remember? And tell him you need his horse."

"Okay…"

"Go!"

"Okay!"

Ann let Shiho down gently and then stood and headed for the gate. The crowd parted before her.

"Mr. Sakamoto!"

"Yeah?"

"Open the gate so she can ride back in! Then help her attach the cart!"

'Right!"

Ryuji again followed his sister.

That left Makoto in the middle of a small crowd with a bleeding girl. The blood wasn't pooling very much, so the bleeding seemed relatively light. Makoto's father taught her how to treat wounds, and she knew that pressure was supposed to be applied to bleeding. But Makoto kept remembering how pressure hurt her broken arm. With the blood loss relatively light, Makoto did not want to go applying pressure to wounds that she didn't understand. She could hurt the girl even more.

"What's this? What's going on!" An anxious male voice shouted from outside the circle of people, and the crowd parted to allow a bald, fat man without a neck to enter the circle. He was dressed in a fine tunic, bowtie, and pants. Makoto felt a sudden surge of guilty anxiety in her body. It was Principal Kobayakawa! Flashbacks of his stern face staring at her in his office flooded her memory. As student council president, she'd been in his office multiple times a week during her time at Shujin.

Kobayakawa's slightly frantic eyes looked at Makoto. They widened with surprised recognition. "Ms. Niijima? What happened?... What are you wearing?"

"Niijima?!" exclaimed someone from the watching crowd.

"The vampire hunter?" said another.

"One of his daughters!"

"Wow! Really!"

"No way!"

"It has to be! Look at that gun on her hip! Why else would a young girl have one?"

Why did people care this much about her damn name? There was a girl dying at their feet and they were more interested in Makoto's name, and Principal Kobayakawa was more interested in her hunting gear. This was wrong. There was something wrong with this city. Something wrong with its people. But the shock of that pessimistic thought stirred Makoto's mind back into motion.

She wasn't a student anymore. Mr. Kobayakawa was not her principal- he was just a principal. "This girl fell from the roof, Mr. Kobayakawa," said Makoto,."I'm going to take her to a physician."

The crowd murmured in surprise and Kobayakawa's eyes widened. Then everyone was distracted for a moment as the gate opened and the sound of galloping hooves crossed the courtyard. Makoto saw Ann's blond head bounce past, riding Amamiya's horse on the way to wherever the cart was, presumably.

Kobayakawa gathered attention back on himself by sputtering out: "A ph- physician, Ms. Niijima?" He was using the same tone he'd used years ago- a surprised and shocked tone that obviously implied Makoto was stupid for thinking of it. She felt a surge of doubt flood through her, as she'd felt so many times in this man's office, as she stood before his desk in her uniform skirt, head bowed before this man's overt disappointment.

"Why would anyone want to spend their last moments on the slab of a graverobber!" yelled someone in the crowd.

"Someone ran for a priest already! She will be sent in peace!"

Makoto felt desperation run through her. The crowd's opinion seemed to share Principal Kobayakawa's opinion. "She's not dead!" yelled Makoto, her head turning back and forth, seeing tense faces of strangers all around. "She might live! We need to try and save her!"

More angered murmuring. "She fell! It's the will of God!"

"Yeah!"

Kobayakawa seemed to gain more confidence from the crowd's reaction. "Yes. I cannot allow you to take one of my students to such a person, Ms. Niijima. She deserves better!"

"But-" said Makoto, her throat catching. Was he right? Were this people right? Was she trying to do the wrong thing? If Principal Kobayakawa thought this was wrong...

"Outa the way! Outa the way," shouted Ryuji, and he appeared between two people in the center of the circle, shoving them apart with spread arms. Makoto turned towards Ryuji's voice, and then her eyes found Ann. The young woman was mounted on Amamiys's black horse, closely following her brother, the school cart rumbling behind her. Ann's eyes were a blazing blue in the afternoon light, and they were entirely focused on Shiho- Makoto could tell from the fear, concern, and determination found on Ann's face.

Was Makoto wrong? Maybe. But she'd started this plan of action, and now the Sakamotos were on that path, as was Amamiya outside. Wrong or no, Makoto could not back down at this point. And what was the worst thing that could happen if she was wrong? Shiho would die, and that was already inevitable if no one helped her.

People shoved and stumbled away enough to let Ann pull up next to Shiho's still form. Makoto knelt down and lowered her cheek to Shiho's mouth. She was still breathing. Barely.

"Mr. Sakamoto, help me lay her in the cart," said Makoto, "Try not to jostle her."

Makoto slid her hands under Shiho's shoulders and tried to cup her forearms together to support the girl's bleeding head. This probably wasn't the best way, but Makoto couldn't think of anything else to do. Ryuji was grabbing Shiho's ankles.

"No! Not there. Grab her waist! Where most of her weight is. Lift from there."

Ryuji complied and together they managed to lift Shiho and move her to the cart, her limp arms and legs dangling. Not ideal, but limbs were not the most essential things in this situation.

"Where am I going?" said Ann, her eyes bright, eager, focused, and still glistening with tears.

"The Yongenjaya district! Keep the speed moderate, Ms. Sakamoto. Haste could jostle your friend. We want to avoid it."

"Ok!"

The cart turned and left the murmuring crowd behind them, the fat official in the center grimacing and sweating. This event was going to go public. Makoto realized using her name was a double-edged sword. It would make this a news item. It might even end up in the paper. Sae was going to be pissed.

Good.

The cart traveled relatively smoothly onto the dirt street. Ryuji had his uniform shirt under Shiho's head as a sort of pillow, it seemed to be doing an okay job of keeping her head from bouncing on the cart surface.

"Try to avoid holes and bumps, Ms. Sakamoto."

"I know!"

They passed Amamiya, still standing quietly on the side of the street. He hopped into the back of the cart as they passed. He kneeled over Shiho and placed his left hand on her bare arm. For a long moment, Amamiya held that pose.

Finally, he took his hand from Shiho. "Ms. Sakamoto! We can slow the pace and be more careful!" he said.

"What?!"

"Your friend is not in immediate danger of death. But there is great danger of exacerbating her crisis. Go slow. Walk the horse."

"How do you know?"

Makoto did not want an argument. She trusted Amamiya to know more about this than she did. He seemed to know things. More things than a frantic high schooler. And herself.

"Listen to him, Ms. Sakamoto!"

"Okay…"

The cart slowed, smoothing their travel to a greater degree.

Makoto was watching Amamiya's placid face. "How do you know?" she asked quietly. "What did you do when you touched her? Is it some sense you have?"

Amamiya's eyes wandered back to hers. They held for a moment. Then looked away.

"We have a deal."

He looked back. Face as still as ever. "I'll tell you later." Then his eyes traveled to Ryuji.

Oh, it was private. Fair enough.

"What about the vampire?"

"He won't come out with the commotion. There's no sense in hunting anymore tonight. Better to not tip him off."

That made sense enough, she supposed. Makoto looked down at the limp girl, clinging to life. Even if she survived, she might be damaged. One of the stablehands on her estate was kicked by a horse when he was little. He was… wrong his whole life. Happy enough, but wrong. Not what he should have been. What he could have been. That loss of potential. That was a tragedy that always bothered Makoto. If he'd been a few feet farther away, what would that stableboy have been? If Shiho had been a few minutes late somewhere, would she have been the target of this vampire? If Makoto's father had not vanished, would they all be a team? The Niijima's together? What they could have been… it was a waste.

This was a waste. This bleeding young woman in this cart.

"Mr. Amamiya, why would the vampire want this to happen? Why make this girl fall off a building? It seems wasteful. Doesn't he want to- to-..."

"Eat her?" Amamiya looked a Makoto with a thoughtful expression. "Yes, surely he did. But as for walking her off the roof. I don't think he did. I think she did."

"But you said she was entranced."

"Yes. I'm sure she was. She was moving in that way. But… I think she was resisting the influence. She wanted to escape, and perhaps death seemed the only option. Her mind was not wholly her own. "

A quick end rather than experience being food for a predator. It was an understandable choice. A defiant choice. Makoto suspected she would pick the same route for herself, if all hope of victory was lost and there were only fangs in the dark. She liked this Shiho girl. Hopefully, she would recover.

"Okay! Where to now!" shouted Ann from astride the leading horse.

Amamiya stood and directed her. They passed Cafe Leblanc, took a right, then a left, and stopped before a wooden two-story building- joined together with all the others like the rest of the neighborhood. A small sign read: "Takemi Tae, Physician."

Ren was satisfied the clinic was where Takemi said it would be. He stepped from the cart. The male Sakamoto was eyeing him with wide eyes. The female one was dismounting from the horse and rushing to the back of the cart.

"I'll fetch her," he said to Niijima. She was proving competent. She could manage the children.

He strode for the clinic.

"Let's wait here and keep her still and warm. Ryuji, give me your shirt," said Niijima as Ren entered the clinic.

A small, bland waiting room was immediately inside the door. It was quite dark. There were no lamps. No lights. No one was here. To Ren's left, a window, and behind that, a desk. No physician. Immediately ahead, another door. Ren entered that door.

Bright light in the center of the room. Takemi was bent over a human body. She straightened up in surprise as Ren entered, her eyes magnified by a strange looking device attached to her head. Her hands held bloody implements.

"Mr. Amamiya!?'

"There is a severely injured young woman outside. She is in need of your aid."

"What happened?"

"She fell from a three-story building."

Takemi's magnified eyes blinked in surprise. Her pupils grew notably. "Truly?" She looked down at the corpse on her table. "This needs to go, then! Help me move it."

Ren opened his mouth to complain at the delay. Yet they were here. The girl was alive and not in immediate danger of death. And it made sense that the physician would not put the injured girl atop a half-dismantled corpse.

He moved to grab the stretcher handles near the corpse's feet. Takemi moved and took the ones by the head. They lifted and carried the man out another door to the rear of the room. They carried the corpse out into a sort of hallway, and Takemi opened a large metal door. Cool air poured out. She entered and Ren followed. It was a large icebox, with several large blocks of ice in the back corner. There was another body here on the left side. They placed the one they were carrying on the sawhorses on the right. The room smelled strongly of old blood.

"How do you move these by yourself?"

"I have a wheeled device. It doesn't matter. I need to clean the table!"

Takemi ran-walked from the icebox with Ren on her heels. They re-entered the exam room. The table seemed clean from Ren's point of view, the corpse's gurney caught all of the related gore. But Takemi picked up a small bucket full of rags and set it on the table. She took one out and began rubbing the surface. Ren took a rag, too. The smell of alcohol was overwhelming.

"What are we doing?"

"Creating a preservative space!"

"What?" asked Ren as he began to rub.

"Rum. Whiskey. Gin. All of it. It basically doesn't spoil. There is some sort of preservative aspect to them. This is a pure form of the chemical all those spirits share. I believe it helps preserve patients if one applies it to surfaces, instruments, and wounds. But it cannot be consumed. It is poison."

"How can a poison be a help to anyone?"

"Are you a physician for humans, dhampir?"

That message was clear. Ren shut up.

In a short moment, Takemi was satisfied. "Very well. I am ready! Lead me to the patient!"

"Wait a moment longer. I have information about her injuries. Listen to my left hand."

"What?"

Ren turned his mind inward. He opened his left hand, showing his palm to Takemi. She looked down at it with a mix of curiosity and impatience.

Morgana, Ren thought, tell me again the injuries you sensed. Speak aloud.

Ren looked down at his own hand. A cat's face appeared in his left palm as Morgana the symbiote rose to the surface. Takemi's eyes went wide with shock. She stared at Ren's hand/Morgana's cat face.

"The bone of her head is pushed inward where she met with the ground. It is creating a pressure upon the organ. Several ribs are broken. The large bone of one leg. The small bone of the other. The right foot. The left wrist. And the right forearm. Several organs are bleeding inside but to a minor degree."

Takemi's gaping mouth closed with a snap. "Is her backbone damaged?"

"I sensed no breaks," said Morgana.

"A miracle," murmured Takemi.

Ren was impressed with Takemi. Her mind was chewing the information. She was shaking off the weirdness of meeting Morgana quite quickly.

She looked at Ren with determined eyes. "Let's go! Help me with this stretcher!"

Ren lead the way back outside. The last vestiges of light were rapidly fading from the world. Three impatient and concerned faces looked up from the cart and watched Ren and Takemi approach.

"Move aside! Move aside," said Takemi, her voice full of authority. "Mr. Amamiya, please set your end up near her head."

Ren complied and climbed into the cart.

"Ms. Niijima! You're here, too? Excellent. Please help us transfer her. Keep her head as still as you can."

"Right! Mr. Sakamoto. Her hips, please! Like before!'

"Yeah! Yeah!"

They transferred Shiho to the stretcher and then carried her inside to the exam room. Niijima and the Sakamotos followed.

"Can you save her?" asked Ann, her voice stretched thin with worry.

"I will try," said Takemi. She began lighting additional lamps that were hanging around the room.

"You don't have electricity?" said Niijima.

"Can't afford it."

Niijima pursed her lips. Ren thought she was probably doubting their course of action in bringing the Shiho girl here, but he was confident. Anyone who could divine the truth of his blood capsules in a matter of seconds was a sharp mind. He wanted this girl to survive. It would make his failure less of a burden. If he hadn't delayed this morning and instead went directly to the school, perhaps he could have prevented this.

*With sun sickness? If you'd managed to find the vampire, he would have killed you.*

Stay out of my thoughts!

*Then don't think so loud!*

Takemi was bathing Shiho's head in water, washing away the blood that was beginning to dry there. She then began gingerly touching the young woman's skull through her hair.

"It's a fairly wide area," said Takemi grimly. She procured a small knife from a liquid-filled jar. Ren presumed it was more of the whiskey chemical. And she placed it upon Shiho's head and began slicing her skin open.

The male Sakamoto let his mouth drop open.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING!?" screamed the female Sakamoto. Her arms reached to stop Takemi.

Ren was surprised. Flat-footed. But the Niijima woman was faster than he was. She snatched the blond girl's arms and pushed her back. "Don't! She knows what she's doing!"

"She's cutting her!"

"She needs to repair what's under the skin! An extra cut on the head is not going to kill your friend, Ann!"

Takemi didn't seem to notice the exchange. She was focused entirely on her craft.

Ren realized they should leave her to it. "Let's go into the other room and let the physician work."

Niijima pushed the Sakamoto siblings back out into the waiting room. Ren followed. Before the door closed, he looked back. Takemi was entirely enraptured with her work, oblivious to the world. She set the bloody blade aside, bathed the new wound, and reached for some other chemically bathed tool that Ren had no name for. Ren took that as a hopeful sign. He let the door close.

Female Sakamoto was holding her head, tears leaking from her face, new sobs wracking her body- though she was obviously trying to contain them. Male Sakamoto guided her to a small couch and sat down with her. Niijima watched them with some concern, then turned her strangely alluring crimson eyes to Ren.

"Can he track her here?"

Her mind was still on business. Ren felt a glow of approval towards this young human woman. She was talking about the vampire at the school. Would it try and finish the job that the Shiho girl had interrupted?

"Yes, he could."

"Will he?"

"I don't know."

Niijma looked at the Sakamotos again, chewing her bottom lip lightly. Ren watched the outline of her face. She had a sharp chin, a small nose, and a profile that would be accounted one of beauty even amongst his mother's people. But there were rings growing under her eyes. She was fatigued.

"I will watch this place," he said. She turned and looked at him, her eyes intense upon his. "Go rest. If he comes here, it will be the end of my hunt. And the end of him."

Her jaw clenched, but she didn't frown. She seemed receptive.

"I left my cycle at the school."

"Can you ride? Take my horse."

"You would trust me with it?"

"If you left and stayed away, the horse would be a small price to pay."

Niijima laughed. The sound seemed to surprise her. Blood flooded into her cheeks. But she nodded.

She walked towards the Sakamoto siblings. Kneeled. Gained both of their attentions.

"Ryuji. Ann. I'm going to go home and get some sleep. I've been away for much longer than just today, Mr. Amamiya says he will keep watch."

Both their eyes flicked to Ren, some fear there. Ren felt a little anger at that, but they couldn't help it. They were kids. And he knew his own kind's reputation. It's why he hunted them himself.

They looked back at Niijima with apprehension.

"Mr. Amamiya is a famous vampire hunter, as you heard Ryuji. And I've learned that he's saved small children from noble vampires. He seems a noble… man."

Ren kept his face neutral, but he felt a soft glow of gratitude grow towards the Niijima woman. What was her name again? Makoto? That was it. Niijima Makoto.

"Stay here. Don't leave," continued Makoto. "We don't know what the vampire might know of us, or if he will come sniffing around."

The Sakamotos nodded again.

Makoto stood. Turned. Walked back towards Ren and gave him a long look. She had an expression on her face that he couldn't read. Worry? Anxiety? Concern?

"I'll be back before sunrise," she said.

Ren nodded and she left.

The watch was dull and slow. The Sakamoto siblings were asleep on the furniture in the waiting room. Ren remained standing near the door.

He was hungry. He hadn't eaten since this morning. The smell of two young humans was becoming... notable. He could vaguely hear their heartbeats. He found his eyes traveling to the female Sakamoto's neck of its own accord.

*Delicious looking?*

Ren clenched his left hand very hard.

*OW!*

He turned and headed back into the exam room. Takemi was still at work on Shiho's head. It seemed she was doing things with bits of bone. Ren still sensed life in the girl, and it was stronger than it was earlier. So whatever Takemi was doing, it seemed to be having some minor beneficial effect. But the smell of blood was thick here, and Ren's mind was filled with a desire to taste it. Shiho was a young woman in the virgin prime of her life- a most delectable taste, or so Ren had read. He was determined never to sample it himself. Takemi also had an amazing scent, but she too was off-limits. They all were off-limits.

Ren grimaced and pushed through the room to the back room. He headed for the ice box and entered where the corpses were stored. He sniffed. The smell he noticed earlier was even more pungent to him now in his state of hunger. He searched. Found a bucket covered in wax cloth.

Ren raised the fabric. The bucket was filled with old blood. Probably from the human corpses Takemi studied in her spare time. Ren grimaced. How old was this? How long were the humans dead before it was harvested?

But a harmless feeding was a harmless feeding. Until Takemi proved she could make his capsules, Ren wanted to preserve his stockpile.

He lifted the bucket to his lips. Tipped it. The half-congealed slop rolled towards his lips, where it rolled in like a half-liquid jelly, heavily twinged with the sour taste of rot.

Fucking disgusting.

He fought back the urge to gag, failed, vomited a little into his own mouth. It's sharp acidity mixed with the sour filth of the old blood.

But he swallowed it back down, and then drank more anyway.