hermes

Hunting in space is never easy.

Dirtside its easy to find a town large enough to cover your movements. More shadows you can count and plenty of spaces to hide. Whod miss one more dropout from the urban sprawl, their trail easily obscured by the detritus of the thoughtless millions that dwell in every direction? You can never go hungry in the city, as long as you keep your wits about you. Or so Ive heard, anyway.

In space its different. Even on a large platform such as this one, everyone is accounted for. Crew, commercials, tourists, diplomats, theyre all logged in an out, and every second they spend in freefall precious. Few go unaccounted for. Worse still, theres nowhere to hide either. Slip up once your ass is theirs. Outside is vacuum, and its not like you can just open the door and run.

Its a real dilemma, and its not like you can just ignore it. The hunger drives you, pushes you. Your desires not your own, and the longer you ignore them, the more danger in losing control. Its better to feed early on, before the pressure becomes too much. You cant plan carefully with the hunger yanking your chain. And to be careful you need to stay calm. Stay focused. Rational. Yeah right.

Its an easy thing to say when all you can dream about is ripping some poor fucker apart so that you can get to the juices inside him. All that moral upbringing, all that guilt laid on by the White Christian Right, its all thrown out with the bathwater. Made like a predator, think like a predator. Its either that or madness or starvation. And when faced with that choice its amazing how quickly your humanity whittles away. Each victim like a knife peeling away another layer. These days its hard to feel anything at all, except for the fear of being found out, of course.

That first taste of crimson nectar is like ambrosia, like liquid fire. The drink of the gods. It doesnt matter that your taste buds and digestive system have been recoded irreversibly by the Stoker Strain. All you care about is the liquid you crave, preferably warm, preferably fresh. No matter the cost. No matter the pain. Even the best designer narcotics cant give you a kick as good as when that first drop hits your tongue. Or so it seems like to me, anyway.

Ironic to think that vampires never really existed until some sicko goth geneticist in a black lab down dirtside managed to find a way to make the horror real after all. Its no surprise that the virus was outlawed, or that all victims are placed into segregated custody a sanitised and publicly acceptable way of saying that they stick you in medical isolation and throw away the key. Screw that. Its not like being infected was my fault. That bitch saw me coming, and I had no idea what she really wanted until it was too late. When they got on to her she spaced herself before shed let them take her away, and luckily although they screened most of the residents and visitors here, some of us managed to slip through the net.

So its been just me for a while now. Its getting lonely after all this time, and proving harder to cover my tracks. I called in most of the favours I had left last time around. If they caught me I dont think I could handle the isolation, the probes, the tests. Too many people are looking goddamn tasty these days though, and I can feel my grip slipping.

That vacuums looking tempting after all.