Tonight I'm not hungry. I shouldn't be surprised, I've had three huge tofu steaks for dinner. So I lock myself in the basement rather than go out and roam the streets. It's cold, it's small, it's not ideal, but there's not much point in spilling blood if I'm too full to enjoy the sensation, is there?
I lock the door that leads to the stairs that lead to my house, so that I don't go back on my promise. I groan. I can't see the moon, but I transform every time it rises. I hate it, but I change: every part of my body grows, especially my usually hidden fangs; my skin turns ghostly white and stretches; my hands and feet become catlike, with pads on the bottom and three long claws on each hand and foot; curved horns shoot out of my head and my hair falls out; a long tail and huge wings shoot out of my back; and my limbs change so that I can walk on all fours. Contrary to popular belief, vampires are not humans with long pointed canines who dress in black capes and burn in the sun. The sun just stops us from transforming into fully-fledged monsters in the day.
When my transformation is complete, my stomach rumbles and I have to remind myself that one, I've already eaten loads, and two, I have claws instead of fingers and I made this cage called a basement vampire-proof so I can't escape. That means I have to pass the time. I try to remember what made me lock myself in here. Oh yes, I made this place so that I can avoid eating my friends and drinking their blood. Or worse, turning them into something like me. Oh, that's how I can pass the time! I can think about my life! Well, my life, my death and my afterlife, my current stage of existence.
I remember when I was a young child. I grew up without brothers or sisters in the countryside. My friends were the birds and the animals who lived in the woods. Then my mother grew ill after getting pneumonia and we had to move to the city. She spent most of her time alive from that point onwards in hospital. I was ten when she died.
Instead of moving back to the country, my father decided he wanted to live near the city, but not in the middle of it all. My auntie lived here so here we are in the so-called Equestrian Suburb, named because of the huge equestrian centre and the dozens of people who own horses here. Well, by here we are, I mean here I am. He died in a horse-riding accident.
It was about six months after this that I died and became a vampire. I was nearly fifteen and living with my auntie and I was leaving a party that I hadn't really enjoyed. I had attended because it was being held by the local zoo to raise money to help endangered species. I was halfway home when I was attacked by an animal and it bit my left arm. For the next three days, I was ill. On the fourth day, I woke up and discovered that I had no pulse and did not need to breathe. I held my breath for ten minutes. That night, I transformed for the first time and experienced my first ever desire to hunt people and drink blood.
Unfortunately, I do have blood on my hands - if you can even call these things with talons hands. My auntie was first. It was in the early days of being this monster I am. I didn't care at the time; I was transformed and I wanted to drink human blood and eat human flesh. I felt really bad afterwards. Luckily, there was enough of her left to dump in a river so I could pretend that she had been kidnapped and brutally murdered by having her limbs ripped off. By someone else. The police never caught me.
I have just realised that I am pacing. I want to get out. What is remorse? Why did I feel sorry for killing my auntie? I'm not even human. Humans kill animals and other humans. They destroy animal habitats. They care more about oil, money and gold than bees, trees and clean water. I was human, but I respected nature. I respect nature even more now. I am vegan by day. Yes, I do eat the flesh and drink the blood of townspeople, but I don't eat meat, poultry, fish or any animal products. I do have animal skins in here, but all of my "human" clothes are made of cotten or recycled plastic.
Oh, I've just remembered the time I tortured Sunset Shimmer! Oh yes I must - for lack of a better expression - relive this. This was before the princess Twilight Sparkle came from another world and made her reformed. She was mean to me back then. I don't think she remembered it. She probably had no idea it was me. I was transformed, and hadn't locked the door to the basement. Instinct overruled sensible thoughts and I left the house. Someone was walking down the road and I spied my chance to get some fresh blood down my throat. I then recognised her and realised that I could make this more enjoyable by teaching the school bully who tried to traumatise me by day a lesson in how to be traumatised. I pushed her into a wall to knock her out, then dragged her into the basement by her short-sleeve T-Shirt and shorts and started to very slowly scratch her. Not bite. Scratch. I didn't want to inject the venom that would turn her into a thing like me. I worked down her arms, carving patterns in her skin. Once I had done her arms, I worked on her legs. Eventually, there was a fairly large pool of blood that I lapped. It was all I could do not to tear her apart. Eventually she woke up and I had to knock her out again. When I was finally human I had to clean up the rest of the blood and take her to hospital, saying that I had found her in the state that I had put her in. The doctors didn't ask any questions, but she seemed a little suspicious. She didn't stop trying to bully me. She probably wouldn't have continued if she knew who had thrown her into a wall and cut her arms and legs.
For someone who was once human, I am evil. I put up quite a façade when I am in public, pretending to be that shy, innocent girl I was before I was turned into a monster. I eat a piece of intestine from one of last week's victims; an old man who I had never met and who screamed a lot until I slit his throat with my claws. Granted, he was chewy, but he was the only person out for miles. I could see, I was on the roof.
I turn back into a "person," unlock the door to the basement and climb up the stairs. I go up to my bedroom and wake my reflection. Using my magic, I can make it step out of any floor-length mirror and it will pretend to be me if there's an event I have to attend at night. Then, when I am human, it returns to the mirror and I have all of its memories from that night. The reflection walks into the mirror and I touch the glass. I remember watching television and showering and going to bed and being woken up by myself and stepping into the mirror. See? It works so well. The only rule: don't let anyone catch both of you together. This will never happen, because I hide in the basement when my reflection is out.
I eat breakfast, get ready and leave. Sunset Shimmer is stood on my doorstep. She is wearing a short-sleeve T-Shirt and I can see the faintest of scars running in a long jagged line down her left arm.
"I remember that you tortured me."
A Vampire's Explanation and Apology
So here I am, on my doorstep, with one of my best friend staring me in the face and telling me that she knows I tortured her. Uh-oh. I have three options. One. Lock her in the basement and thoroughly enjoy eating her tonight. There's a chance that she will either pick the lock or phone the police to say that she's been kidnapped. Two. Ask her to come inside, slit her throat and throw her in the basement. People will notice that she's missing. Plus, I am currently "human" and feel remorse. Three. Explain to her that I'm a vampire. Hell no. Telling her means telling all my friends.
"I'm coming in," she says, "I have a feeling that you're hiding something."
"No." I can't let her know.
"Why not? You're just proving that you have something to hide. Either let me in and tell me or watch me ring the police."
Oh. Blackmail. I should have seen that coming a mile off. This is Sunset Shimmer. She knows how to blackmail someone with ease.
"No?" she asks.
"Come in," I mumble, quietly planning how to force her into the basement and push the sofa down the stairs so that she can't escape.
She sits on the sofa and asks me to come over. Reluctantly, I sit at the other end.
"So," she says, getting straight to business, "I remember being attacked at night on this street. I remember being thrown into a wall. I remember waking up in a basement with the walls spattered in blood. I remember staring at a creature. It had bat-like wings and two curved horns on its head. It looked a lot like a hairless cat. Its claws were cutting my arms and legs. It used its mouth to throw me into the wall again by my T-Shirt and knock me out. It's strange that I remember being in a room whilst the torture goes on and then waking up in the street where the monster attacked me. Then you just happen to find me. You carry me in such a way that the police can't do DNA tests on my clothes because they know your DNA is on there. Admit it. You're a monster."
I have nothing to say. My mouths opens but I can't think of anything that might defuse the situation. I make no noise, but tears stream down my face as I realise everything she said is true. I kill other people just because I want to, because I can't control myself. Even when I appear human and think like a human, I am a monster who cannot control itself. Yes. I am an it. A thing. A monster. A beast. I killed my own auntie! What kind of niece is that?! I am evil. I should crawl in that basement, lock it and never step outside again. But what happens if I get hungry? I'll never die because I'm already dead, and my beast instincts could take over...
She shuffles up the sofa and wraps a scarred arm around me. I smile through the tears.
"I have a voice inside my head," she tells me. "I have an inner demon. I have murderous rages. Although I don't eat other people. That's a new one for me." I laugh, despite myself. "So, what's it like being a monster?"
I think hard before I speak. "It's difficult. I can smell blood. Every day that I go to school, I can smell blood in other people's veins. I have a drive to get that blood in whatever way I can. Some days it's all I can think about."
She pauses before saying, "Vampire. A beast that pretends to be human and eats other people. Known for drinking blood. How come you eat vegetables then?"
"I always have. I can't eat animals. I guess it's part of being an animal. Plus, vampire taste buds tend to prefer human." I sniff. "Go away, your blood smells so sweet! Adrenaline!" She shuffles back to the other end of the sofa. "Thanks. I was going to lose it there."
We sit in silence for a bit, then Sunset asks a question that I wasn't expecting.
"Remember when you attacked me? Could you taste that I wasn't really human?"
"Hmm," I say, "I - I think I could. Your blood wasn't as nice. You were - sour."
"You mean like those sour sweets you can buy at Sugarcube Corner?"
"Yes. A bit."
"Yeeeewwww. By the way, we're going to be late for school."
I look at the clock. "Yay. School. No blood. No meat. Pretending to be vegan. I can't exactly eat someone's flesh for lunch, can I?"
I really did not need to hear that."
We walk outside and I notice that something is wrong. The sun is setting instead of rising. About half of it is below the horizon. Sunset looks at me.
"This is bad," she says. "Fluttershy, go somewhere that you can't hurt anyone. Now."
Why?
"Why?" I question.
"No sunlight. You'll turn on me." I realise too late that I left the house without the keys. I am locked out. I feel myself growing and all of a sudden I spot someone down the street who is actually human and I can smell that they have a cut and all I can think about is blood. Blood. Blood. I watch them with mild interest as the rain begins to fall and a crescent moon appears between the clouds. I snarl as the person walks away.
"Fluttershy," Sunset says cautiously. I growl at her for distracting me and look at the human. He stares at us as Sunset walks in front of me. She holds out a hand and tells me, "No. Bad girl. I can find a way to help you if you don't attack anyone. I see something in her eyes. Something that is rare to see in the eyes of Sunset Shimmer. Hurt. Not hatred. Not fear. Hurt. Hurt at what I am about to do. She tells the person to leave slowly. I want to tell her that I am starving. All I manage is a whimper. I fight against the urge to attack the person. I turn back into a person and find myself on my hands and knees, the tears running again at what I am. I curl up and wish that I was still a small girl, that my parents and my auntie and I were still alive, that I had never turned into this thing. I could do anything to wipe myself from existence. I just lay there weeping, doing something remotely human. Then I realise that I have a heartbeat and a breath in my body and weep with joy and guilt and apologise to those people whom I killed. I hug Sunset, and we both decide that we need a day off school. We clean the basement and I lick some blood and it tastes disgusting. I am human. I am human. The sun returns to normal. I am human.
But that night, I become a beast again and lock myself away, cleaning the blood off the walls of the basement with my tounge and cursing everything that led me to my demise as a person. The fact is, I have a beast raging inside me and it will never go away. I have adopted a new philosophy though. There is no point in wishing that I am something I am not. I am a vampire. I am a beautiful vampire. I have human friends and help other humans. I help other animals like me. The vicious ones who need a bit of friendship to fight their greatest enemies: themselves.
I am who I am, and I am proud of it.
