I crawled out of a small, concrete-lined reservoir, if you could even call it that. It was just a large decorative pond in Forest Park. When I breached this surface, I tried to do so quietly. It was still the middle of the night, and there were very few people roaming at this hour in the darkness of the park, but as a supernatural creature trying to stay unnoticed. You could never be too careful.

  I trudged through a grass field, pants and boots brimming with water, sopping wet. I slung my arms downwards, trying to sling some water out of the fabric of my clothes. I had to take off my jacket and hoodie as I paced through the shadows, twisting and squeezing the water out of them. I’d have done the same to my pants, but I didn’t want to be caught out in the open with my pants off. It wouldn’t do good for my image as a serious killing machine, not to mention that was the kind of shit that brought you more attention. I couldn’t have the locals out at this hour, calling the cops on a man running around in the dark, half-naked from the waist down.

  I walked with purpose, flaring my senses, trying to feel for anything that would alert me to that massive spider that had eluded me. When I reached out with the pulse sense, I didn’t feel anything. I wondered if, maybe, it was because I was searching for the spider itself. Maybe since it no longer held that form, I couldn’t connect to it. Whatever shape it was using to hide amongst the civilians was even cloaking it from my Primeval abilities. I kept trying, eagerly expecting to have my pulse connect to it… But there was nothing. All that I felt was the space around me, and the vague moving shapes of those who didn’t match who I searched for.

  I noticed a cold fog at my back. It was slowly circling me, and I realized quickly that it was not natural…

  “And first contact has been made,” someone acknowledged behind me.

  I spun on my heels quickly, ready to rip their fucking head off. Was it the spider?

  What I saw gave me a startled pause. Directly behind me was an exact spitting image of… me. It looked exactly like me, whoever this person was. My mind ran quickly as I thought it could be this shape-shifting spider that transformed into a humanoid and fled into a crowd. However, the pitch-black eyes that stared back into my blackening eyes told me of another identity. It was Death.

  “You're here because of that spider?” I asked him.

  “I’m not here,” he informed me coldly, with no emotion.

  That’s right, he couldn’t enter the real world, not without causing some kind of mass catastrophe. It was just odd seeing him standing in front of me that I didn’t question that fact.

  “I told you there were others. Others like the Unseen. The spider you just met is a child of something much greater. A spawn of a Primeval.”

  “A Primeval? I thought you’d said that it takes a lot of work to get to these things… How am I already running into another?”

  His cold black eyes stared at me for a moment. That’s when I noticed he wore a much paler skin tone than my own.

  “The work has already been accomplished before you. Jon and those before him have paved a path that is coming to fruition. There are many variables and branches to this plan, and it has come to the point where you now stand. Don’t dwell on the overall picture. That’s not your role. You just need to do your job. Find them, and kill them.”

  “Them… there are more of them?” I asked, then quickly added. “So that spider… person… is tied to another Primeval, like I am?”

  “No. That comparison is not accurate. It’s a child of the Primeval of Hunger. It has direct lineage to the Hunger itself. This child is very old, an elder of the pits.”

  The pits? I thought to myself about the place. The secret twisting tunnels that never allowed me access to the deeper, hidden realm beneath the city. I was always just skating the surface, blocked out somehow, and kept away from their dark sanctuary.

  “It probably fled back there after our encounter. How do I get in? I’ve been down there, all over the place, and I’ve never been able to find a way to go deeper.”

  “There are things that are even hidden from me, just like the domain of the Unseen. The pits are the domain of Hunger.”

  “Wait, wait, wait… back up. A Primeval’s domain is sitting beneath the city. How is that even possible…” I shook my head at this strange information.

  “Just as I could not enter the Primeval of the Unseen’s domain on my own, neither can I access Hunger’s. Without you smuggling my blade into his realm through the connection you have to my blade, we wouldn’t have been able to kill him. Not as we did.”

  “So that’s it… I just need to find my way in? Figure out how to get in and pull your blade again?” I asked, actually excited.

  This felt big… like really fucking big. Not that I was some gung-ho yes-man just waiting on a task from my boss or some shit like that; I thought it would be a good distraction. I wanted a name and a vision, but this… this would do.

  “This will be different than the last encounter you had with one of their kind.” Death still had an emotionless voice, but I felt a sense of… approval. A recognition that I was not totally wrong. “The first step is gaining access to Hunger’s domain. Others you already know have the knowledge you seek… for a price. It’s time you return to Abel,” Death said as his words trailed off.

  “Abel? Why him?”

  The first time I had met the old, withered, black man, he had told me that he wanted me to destroy the pits. To ‘raze them to the ground,’ if I remembered right. He had a lot more information than he was telling me when we met for the first time; he must be much more connected to the supernatural world than even Martin knew. Especially if Death was sending me in his direction.

  “That, you will have to learn on your own.” Death shifted his stance, the slightly skewed mirror image of me changing his demeanor as he gazed upon me. “There’s a reason the spiders are moving. There’s been a shift in the Primeval realm; the Unseen’s death created waves that made the rest of them aware. They know a force great enough to kill one of their own has risen… something they thought they had escaped long ago. They’ll be extremely cautious, and for that I’m going to need to take something from you.”

  Death raised his hands and reached out in front of me. His hand tore through the fabric of reality as he reached into the hidden place where the blade rested. Deaths weapon. He slowly pulled a long, wickedly sharp blade covered in runes and symbols from an invisible dimension. A flood of power filled the surface of the blade but did not leave it. Death had ultimate control of his weapon… his power, even in this reflection, this image of himself. He barely glanced at it, then waved his hand, and it faded from existence.

  A fear shot through me, and I couldn’t stop myself from asking quickly.

  “Wait, you’re taking it? Why?” The questions almost seem to come not from me but from the monster within me. My Primeval didn’t want to let it go. He wanted it within his grasp… to feed off of the energy it emitted.

  “If you take that blade down into the pits, the Primeval of Hunger will sense it. They will flee… and it will change the board, ruining many generations of hard work by your predecessors. I cannot let you keep it, or you may ruin millennia of preparation.”

  “Flee… can’t we just kill it instantly like we did with the Unseen?” I asked quickly.

  Death had no time for my bullshit and quickly cut me off, “No! As I stated… this is different; not a clean single move, and not isolated from the living world as the Unseen. Think of this like a surgical operation. We must enact our plans with precision…” Death’s black eyes somehow grew darker. “Otherwise, risk the lives of everyone in the city of St. Louis, Missouri.” He offered nothing else.

  As much as it pained me, and Myordrakien, to admit it, I could understand why he took it. He operated on a scale so big I couldn’t see the edges. If he said something had to be a certain way, who was I to question him? Though… part of me felt uneasy without it. Like it was my very own security blanket… but I think that was just the monster’s feelings on the matter.

  “Millennia?” I asked as I chewed on the word.

  “You are new. You’ve had Annihilation and my blade in you for a mere breath. Those who carried the burden before you built every brick of this great path to lead us to where we are now. Branches of the Primevals’ power had to be removed… cut off, to weaken them. Ties had to be severed. Alliances were shattered to isolate and contain them in a way that kept us hidden. Yes, they are aware of my presence peripherally, but to them, the “death” they knew has been destroyed when they allied themselves against the Primeval of Annihilation. The destruction of Annihilation itself was what immortalized them… at least that was their initial thought. The Primevals had no idea the grander scheme at play, and that even Myordrakien had reins on him. If they sense the power from the blade, they will remember those early days after Myordrakien fell… and they will flee deeper. Too much has been sacrificed and painstakingly set in motion to allow you to throw off the path now with the blade.”

  I wanted to ask what he meant by, ‘remember those early days.’ What did he do exactly when he made the deal with Myordrakien?

  Remember what? I thought the words, but I didn’t say them. I remembered the shift in the Unseen’s demeanor as Death’s presence flooded the hellfire domain. He was scared… that great titanic creature was terrified as Death descended. But his fear felt separate… like he recognized his brother, Myordrakien, in me, and when Death arrived… he knew it was something else… something familiar… maybe.

  “Ever since you’ve had the blade in your possession, you and the monster have relied too much on its sustenance. It’s time to kill and feed on the death you reap with your own hands. You still need to grow stronger for what is to come. The taking of the blade is twofold; to progress my plans… and to progress your power.”

  I didn’t say anything for a moment. His words hit me hard. I knew they were true. After that first wave of vision after vision, before I came back and killed Peter Grimwood, I had been killing as the monster. However, in the grand scheme of things, most of that time was spent on foot, traveling between kills. Most of the time, I felt the innate draw of the monster siphoning Death's power from the blade itself. Bypassing the need to feed as often as I did in my early days. I also wondered if there were other reasons for taking the blade… things Death had going on that he just wouldn’t tell me. I was deep in thought about this, staring at the ground.

  I looked back up to ask Death my next question, but he was gone. I glanced around the area, seeing nothing, and no longer feeling the chill that accompanied his image. It also spoke volumes to me how even a projection of an image affected the physical world. It wasn’t even how he looked… if he had a real look. He was copying me now, not Jon anymore. Maybe he was trying to make me feel more comfortable… or maybe there was a reason for that too, but he wouldn’t tell me. Honestly, it just weirded me out even more.

  The moment I truly grasped that Death was gone… I felt something; something unexpected. A hollowness opened up in me… a want… a need that I hadn’t felt in a while; not since before I met the Chasse family. The need… it was there… it was clawing at me from the inside. It always had… and it had never left… but I hadn’t realized how small it had gotten in the back of my mind. I thought that I was just growing in my inner strength, getting used to the killing and the battle that raged inside. But now… now I knew it wasn't me. I could feel it. My willpower was not some unshakable thing that had overpowered the need, shoving it in the cage with Myordrakien. It was the blade.

  Maybe that's why the Primeval of Annihilation stayed there, locked in my mental prison… it was somewhat content there… feeding from the blade. Now that its constant supply of Death’s power was gone… the black hole that demanded to be filled with death beckoned. It grew in my mind, swallowing my attention. Pinpricks needled out of my inner workings, my guts, my blood, my bones… everything. I felt the change crawl over my body like an infection.

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  Like a mental defense that sprang into action… I forced myself to shed things… things I had grown accustomed to in this new second life. Emotion… want… family… friends… I couldn’t think about any of it. In that moment, I had to focus on things that were small… just like in the old days; breathing was number one. The world around me shrank until I was the only thing in existence. My body… and the monster bristling within was all my mind had the mental capacity to comprehend for a moment as the need gripped me tightly… full force. Everything else came second.

  My teeth had clamped down, and I didn’t remember doing it. I just felt them quivering under pressure as the need hit me like a dump truck. It was familiar… but it was stronger than I was used to. Death was right… the blade had been a crutch.

  It was like… like a weightlifter that had hit a new max, walked around bragging to all of his friends, and that became the thing he was known for. Then, got comfortable and stopped working as hard as he had to hit this new achievement. Then, when it came time to put up or shut up… he crumpled under the weight.

  I had maintained the hunger before… the need to kill… to stamp out the lives of others. But it had been so long since I carried the weight… truly carried that weight; now that I had to again, it felt like starting over.

  I hadn’t even realized it yet, but I started walking again. The foggy chill that had embraced me fully dissipated now. I only got a few steps before I heard movement behind me. I gritted my teeth in annoyance as I didn’t want to deal with anyone in my extremely agitated mental state. I hoped it was a threat… because they would be the first ones I threw into the black hole of the Primeval’s need.

  One theatrical vampire… one eight-legged freak… a visit from the Grim Reaper… now what… I turned sharply to face the person I could sense just out of arm's reach.

  A familiar redhead stood there looking at me with a strange expression in her eyes. It quickly faded and was replaced by the usual attitude.

  “Easy killer,” she said mockingly.

  “Alex,” I spoke through clenched teeth, sizing her up. I was wondering what she was doing there. “What do you want?” It came out aggressively.

  “Well, I was hunting a little blonde menace that was keeping tabs on someone she met at the bar… but it seems that someone else beat me to it.” She could tell something was different about me. Her eyes darted around the area subtly, trying to gather details.

  “You were hunting her?” My voice sounded weird as it came out, like it was someone else's. It was me saying it all, but there was a blankness to it… no inflection… no emotion.

  “Girls gotta eat.” She said it and pulsed her eyes a brilliant crimson. “Seems like you royally fucked that up. But I gotta say, that spider was… fucking huge. Did you kill it?”

  “You saw it?” That grabbed my attention.

  She nodded with a rare look of worry in her eyes.

  “No, it got away,” I admitted in frustration. “It shape-shifted or something… crawled out of the pond and walked away on human legs. There were too many people around… I couldn’t follow into the crowded area by that restaurant over there,” I motioned into the distance where I could still hear the roar of music and conversation.

  “That’s definitely one of the weirdest things I’ve seen in this city,” she spoke honestly, the usual snark gone, yet she kept staring.

  “Yeah, no kidding,” it was hard to hold the conversation with what I had raging inside.

  We stood in silence for a few moments, just eyeing each other up and down with a slightly aggressive demeanor in both of us. She was trying to figure out what was happening with me, but the way she kept looking at me was…

  “Why are your eyes black?” She asked again. “You about to run after that thing or something?”

  “My eyes are…”

  Before I could repeat her observation, I felt it. The monster had leaked out into my eyes, and the burning had started in my mouth and fingers. I hadn’t noticed immediately because I was still clenching my teeth. I was also clinching my fists hard as hell as I fought off the internal struggle of the demanding need that now plagued me full force.

  I recentered myself and took a deep, calming breath. I had to let go of that part and focus on being small… being human. It took longer than I’m proud to admit, but slowly, I felt my human features returning.

  Alex didn’t question it or make any stupid comments about the very long, very awkward moment. She just watched me standing in strange silence.

  I opened my eyes, and she remained watching me intently. She showed no emotion or interest in her expression, but I could tell there was a lot there.

  There was something between us that I couldn’t pin down. Sometimes she seemed like she wanted to be friendly, while other times she seemed to be looking at me like someone she would kill. I know I was doing the same to her right in that moment. But the monster was agitated after the loss of the blade.

  “So what are you going to do next? Are we going to hunt that thing?”

  “We?” I asked her, angry at the assumption she could tag along.

  “Well, I can’t let you screw up my meal and then get the main course all to yourself. Plus, you don’t even need anything, do you? You don’t feed?” She looked inquisitive as she asked, like she had spoken about this with someone. Probably Martin.

  Oh, how little did she know.

  I paused a moment before answering, trying to figure out just how much I wanted to tell her. We were kind of friendly before, but after Autumn’s reaction, I was a little apprehensive about telling anyone the truth about my nature. Now, with what I felt inside, and what I knew might be in my future… I was unsure.

  “Not in the way you do,” I struggled to get out.

  She raised her eyebrows, noticing the effort. “Oh, so you do feed on something… I don’t think Martin knows that little gem.”

  “Or he just didn’t tell you,” I snapped.

  Her eyes opened wide for a split second, surprised and amused by my tone.

  “Testy, huh…” she eyed me carefully from the outer edge of a ten-foot radius as she circled me. “Something’s different about you…” She didn’t say anything else… she just left it at that, watching.

  “Are you gonna tell Martin?” I asked, but I could tell she realized my tone didn’t give a fuck.

  Her amusement fell off quickly.

  “We don’t tell each other everything.”

  I flipped the questioning on her, my inner rage brimming out as I felt the need to kill push me. “I thought you two were close. You guys have been working in that bar for a long time, huh?”

  She ignored my attitude and just responded.

  “Close is a bit of an overstatement. I do value my relationship with Martin, however, he’s still…” Alex looked hesitant to say the words. “He’s still a vampire.”

  She waited a moment to gauge my reaction. The only thing I gave her was cocking my head to the side a little, intrigued enough that it pulled my attention away from the need… just for a second.

  “Not to mention, he used to kill humans. He wasn’t always the small business owner and upstanding member of this little hunting squad,” she mocked his status.

  “So what exactly does that make him to you?” I was getting pretty interested.

  This was a side of Alex that I hadn’t seen yet. A part of her that I truly didn’t understand before. I just assumed that since they worked inside the bar together, and I only really knew Alex through Martin, that they were mutual friends.

  “He's… a means to an end. He helps me live in this world the way I do. However, I’m always watching him… observing. He’s tasted human blood before; who's to say he won't again? When he does, I’ll be there.”

  “Wow,” was all I said, truly not expecting that.

  “Don’t act so surprised, Sam,” she actually used my name. “Martin knows what he is as well. He’s openly asked me to kill him if he ever turns back to his old ways. Obviously, I won’t hesitate to do just that. Until then… as long as he stays on the level, I won't eat him. Plus, I'm not invincible as you may think.”

  “I don’t think that,” I assured her.

  “I’m sure you don’t,” she smiled cockily before continuing. “I know I can't take on the world, and I need allies if I want to continue doing what I'm doing. Martin is a cloak I wear in this dark world. I use him, his alias, and his bar to blend in with the rest of the monsters while I continue my own goals.” Her smile faded quickly, and she added, “As soon as he does something I can’t allow… the need for him will be over.”

  I nodded, feeling the internal drive of my monster vehemently agreeing with every word she just said.

  “What about you?” she asked. “If he did something that goes against what we will allow, would you kill him? Could you?”

  “What do you mean by ‘we’ will allow? We’re not some kind of dynamic duo.” I narrowly eyed her.

  Alex let out a true laugh that seemed more carefree and unburdened than I thought the situation called for. Maybe that’s just because I was living in two worlds at the same time: one in a conversation with her, and the other battling an invisible enemy that just wanted me to reach out and rip the life from her. I pictured how I could do it… many different ways… I could…

  The monster shook its head mentally, not wanting her life. She didn’t fit the mold. He knew that, and in his acknowledgement, I knew that too. Nothing else needed to be said. Alex… the Anthropophagus vampire did not meet the standards. She did not fit the bill for what we were looking for.

  And just like that… in this moment at least, I felt the need dip a little while I talked with Alex.

  “No… that we are not. But you have to admit there are similarities between us. I hunt down and kill vampires, yet I am one. I kill killers. You kill killers. I’ve kept my eye on you ever since I first saw you. You’ve never killed an innocent person that I knew of.” Alex’s face got very serious, any sign of amusement gone as we spoke in the darkness of Forest Park. “You’ve slain many that were deserving… many more, I think, that your friends probably don’t know about.” She did something with her eyes that made me think she knew something I had done in my past that the others might not know about.

  Maybe it was a kill that she linked me to that no one else had written me down for. How closely was she watching me… how much had she hoped I was someone that she could kill?

  “If the cards were on the table, could you kill Martin… Carter's friend, if he stepped out of line? Even if Carter didn’t want you to?”

  I just stared at her, trying to figure out what she was getting at. Trying to figure out whatever her game was.

  “What do you want?” I asked bluntly.

  “I want to know what you’re going to do,” Alex responded just as bluntly

  “About what, Alex. Stop beating around the bush!”

  “About everything,” her attitude started to resurface, and she started to yell her next words. “Are you going to keep playing make-believe with this human girl? Are you going to pretend to not be what you are... a fucking killer. Are you going to keep playing house with these humans… and deny the truth?” Alex stepped closer to me quickly, almost touching as we were face-to-face. Her voice was angry… somewhat disgusted. “We are monsters, not like the rest of the supernatural world. We are the ones that the normal monsters are afraid of. We have to remember that… use that. We can’t be ourselves by pretending to be something else… something already dead.” Her words were the harshest I had ever heard her speak. It held the most emotional conviction about anything spoken to me as the monster. There was so much passion in what she was saying that it confused me. She was talking about me… but also herself.

  Her demeanor shifted to a quieter, calmer, and slower pace as she continued. “We also can’t taint the lives of humans that still have lives to live. That time… is over for you. As hard as it is to accept that… we’re no longer a part of that world.”

  Alex’s words were harsh and came from a place of conviction that I did not expect. For a flash of a second… I believed her. Every word of it made sense. The deepest parts of me, the human side, understood something that remained unsaid between the lines of her rant. But then… then it started to piss me off. Who the fuck was she to tell me what to do? Who was she to push her views onto me?

  “What’s this ‘we’ shit?” I stared her down, point-blank, my eyes going pitch-black. I felt the words leave my voice twisted and warped as the Primeval’s voice layered over my own, as it did when I fully transformed. “Why don’t you worry about your fuckin’ self. Go back to the bar… and serve some more fuckin’ drinks.”

  I looked at what she was wearing with my obsidian voids. Go figure, a super low cut, white V-neck shirt, and tight jeans that revealed every curve of her body. She was enticing to say the least, but the monster inside of me was roiling with fury after losing the connection to the blade and then listening to her words sink in.

  “Go find yourself a nice college boy to drool all over you! As far as I can tell, that’s about all you’re good for!” I hoped that would piss her off.

  Alex cocked her head back and laughed, “Claws are coming out, huh. Just remember… the truth hurts. As soon as words start sounding good… know you’re standing in a bunch of bullshit.”

  I sighed, tired of her games. I turned and started walking in the direction I knew Abel’s house was in. He was my next best step at finding answers about the spider and the pits. I gathered myself and numbly forced myself forward, turning from Alex without another word. I was tiring of her games… of her opinions… of everything. I just wanted to get away and find silence so I could battle against this hunger for death that I craved.

  Death had sent me on a mission, no name or vision, but a mission all the same. I wasn’t exactly sure what I had to do except get inside the pits. I had a bit of blind faith in what Death had told me. He had been plotting this for a long time. I just had to trust in his words, trust that I could handle living without the blade; if Death took it, he knew what I’d be dealing with, right? If he knew it would be like this, he had to know that I could do it. For now, all I could do was start walking down that path.

  Alex’s feet stayed close behind me, mirroring my movements, staying a ways back in the shadows like I couldn’t sense her.

  I cut my eyes back a few times, looking over my shoulder at her. She was completely serious, her amusement with our conversation and my outburst gone. She knew I was making a move towards finding that spider. And she wanted to be a part of it. Plus, I knew she had more to say and wasn’t done. I think she was trying to teach me something, and school was still in session.

  Fuck that! I wondered randomly if I could just knock her out without killing her? Would the monster allow that? Would it even let me try?

  Then I had another thought, an odd one; the monster was keeping me from killing Alex. It could feel that she was wrong for us in that way. It couldn’t willingly take her life, and it was telling me no. Me… I was the one who felt antagonistic towards her. If the human side of me thought that… maybe… maybe I did hear something that I didn’t want to hear.

  If the monster didn’t deem her worthy of death, and she was a mutated vampire, that said something to me that I didn’t want to admit. She might have been right about some of the things she said… and it was me who didn’t want to admit it, but the monster knew the truth.

  That pissed me off even more, and I picked up the pace, trying to lose her in the shadows and trees. Maybe I could try the sewers, lose her down in the darkness beneath the city.

  After a few minutes of walking in the darkness, she walked a little faster to get even with me, standing side by side as we paced the shadows.

  “Where are we going?” She finally asked in a very neutral, non-passive-aggressive tone, like we hadn’t just been yelling in each other’s faces.

  It took me a full three minutes to reluctantly respond. Giving her an annoyed side eye for the whole three minutes. Finally, I caved just so the moment of awkward frustration would die and I could continue to be angry in silence.

  “Do you remember Abel?” I asked about the time Martin led us to his old friend’s house.

  “The old man on the river?” she asked.

  “Yep,” was all I said, and we continued through the shadows.