Growing Up – Part three
High School - Year One

They were all in the same school again. Kuro was a junior; he had taken a year off to watch Flick in the hospital. Eric was a freshman with Flick and for the first time ever Flick was the oldest in her class next to Eric. They had all ended up getting held back in school thanks to Flick’s time in the hospital. Eric was 16 years old and driving now, Kuro was 19 and also driving, and poor Chris and Flick were the youngest at only 15. The newest member of the group, Cross, was 21 with his own apartment were the five of them often spent time after school.

Chris had a run in with the male vampire’s mate; Cross had killed the male during the football game which left Flick in the hospital. This instantly dragged Chris into the circle of the supernaturally connected friends. While he was furious for being left out of the loop at first; he soon gained a sense of wishing he was still out of the loop.

The experience happened over the summer while Chris was out with Eric and Flick; he still hadn’t met Cross, who was out with Kuro looking at weapons. While Flick was out cold in the hospital bed Kuro had taught Eric tricks on picking out different immortal creatures; no one ever really believed it would come in handy.

They were out on a rather chilly day in the middle of summer; it was only around 80 degrees outside; which was chilly compared to the average of 90 something degrees. They got bored hanging around Chris’s house, and decided to head to the park not far from the river Flick and Eric used to spend time at as a kid. They were also too bored to try driving there, so they decided to walk. Eric knew this was a bad idea, but what could he say to Chris? He didn’t even know anything smarter than humans existed.

The walk there was fine, and while the park was oddly empty Eric noticed nothing out of the ordinary. It wasn’t until the shadows began to grow longer on the ground and the air chilled did anyone notice anything, and then even Chris noticed something.

She watched them from the shadows; her trail having led her directly to Flick. That was the girl her mate had been trying to find that night for reasons she would never understand. According to him, and many others of their current group, she was some form of ‘special’ human who was born with genes specifically made to keep her ahead of the immortals. She laughed at this, and now that she was here and able to truly smell Flick she smelled no more than human; while oddly sweet with a strange tang of something different, she was still human.

As the sun set she left her shadows to stalk towards them; her walk heavy and her eyes locked on Flick. Chris was the first one to see the newcomer; and made a stupid comment to Eric about that hot woman. Eric turned to see who he was speaking about, and knew right away what she was.


Rule Number One. Vampires are fearless. They will stalk their prey, humans, until a force of God stops them; this having to be death. They walk talk and appear human all except for the perfect beauty, a beauty designed to lure unwilling humans to them. They all have high cheek bones, and they all have some shade of crimson red in their eyes. While their body forms are all different whatever size or shape they may be they will be the most beautiful. They will have no color in their face and they cannot blush.


She walked without any weapons, her eyes locked on Flick; who Eric was now standing in front of protectively. She stopped a good ten feet away from them, glanced towards Chris and then Eric for a moment before locking her eyes back on Flick; her crimson eyes bright. She was hungry, but had no intention of feeding off Flick; perhaps if the two males didn’t run she’d make a snack out of them.

She wore tight blue jeans which only made her already perfectly long legs that much more perfect. On top of her upper body she was a sleeveless white shirt which was low cut into her chest; exposing just enough of her cleavage. Her breasts was large, but not unnaturally so, and her face was thin with high cheek bones and gorgeous. While her lips were full they were almost as pale and drained from color as the rest of her. Her black hair was cut to her shoulders and slightly messy from a day or so of running.

“What are you…?” It was Chris who spoke, her voice giving away his obvious interest in her. Eric wanted to grab his arm and pull him back behind him; but he was too far away for that without leaving Flick unguarded and that was what she wanted.

She smiled all too pleasantly at Chris; her eyes never leaving Flick. “Child, you do not need to know what I am, it won’t suit you in death. It will do you no good.” Her voice was perfect, it even surpassed Flick’s, and this was something Eric wasn’t prepared for. He had always thought Flick’s to be the most perfect voice in the world, and here a demon in a gorgeous woman’s body proved him wrong. He hated her for that.

Then Eric realized she was gone. Dread filled his soul as he turned to see her on the other side of Flick now, moving closer. His mind was rolling in slow motion, and he knew no matter how quickly he ran for her it would be too later. He wanted to scream, but nothing came out.


Rule Number Two. Vampires are extremely fast, never let them speak or else their perfect voices will entrance you long enough for them to get around anything you may have in their way. You cannot defeat a vampire unless you are faster than them, and this just simply will never happen in the human world. You must be the first to strike, and once you realize this it is too late.


He saw Chris move from the corner of his eye; and he saw the female vampire hunch over in a position to lunge towards Flick. He had never seen any human move as quickly as Chris did then; even in his slow motion vision that was now stuck in his mind. He stepped back, as if that would actually do anything, and he saw Chris get to Flick’s side just as she lunged.

She jumped fast and hard, aiming for Flick’s throat, it would only take one quick attack and she would be dead. Chris managed to get there first, somehow, and threw himself between her and Flick. She didn’t notice this until her fingers dug into something that wasn’t a throat. Flick stood there in stunned silence, having turned around just in time to see Chris jump in front of her.

Eric’s mind clicked back into normal speed, and he saw Chris fall to the other side of Flick; holding onto his bloody left shoulder, the blood was coating down his fingers and his left sleeve and arm. That was when he heard Flick yell for a tiny second, and the female vampire froze; she had jumped back the moment she realized she had missed, Chris’s blood dripping down her right hand’s fingers.

Eric saw Flick fall to her knees, and dropped to her side to see that some blood had splattered onto her face. She was staring blankly down into the grass; which had spots of blood on it. She was also growling softly to herself, a sound Eric had never heard before. Apparently the vampire had never heard it before either because she was still standing perfectly still before them.

“Flick…?” Eric mumbled to her softly, scared to touch her…her entire body seemed to shake, and now her hands was clawing into the ground on either side of her. The tension in the air was picking up; and just as quickly as it came it ended and the vampire fell to her knees…as if she had been pulled.

Flick didn’t look at Eric, she didn’t make any attempt to respond to her, her glare shot up to the vampire; who had fallen to her knees and now looked as if she was chocking. Eric didn’t know a vampire could chock. Flick’s lips pulled back from her teeth, exposing the fangs Eric had seen once before; when Cross had showed them her fangs right after she passed out. He hadn’t seen them since, and didn’t even know she still had them.

Eric forced himself to look away for Flick long enough to watch the Vampire; she now appeared to not only be chocking, but to be having to keep herself from falling to the ground. She was bracing herself against the ground, her entire body tense. Then it was calm again, and the tension flooded into the air. The vampire was able to move freely and took this time to sit straight up on her knees again.

Before she was able to and before Eric was able to do anything else Flick was standing and walking slowly towards her; ignoring Eric’s pleads for her to stop, but the female vampire sunk into a sitting position and stared up at Flick with fear…actual fear in her eyes.

Eric watched her with morbid curiosity; he didn’t know a vampire could have fear…especially against a human, but he also knew that at this exact moment in time Flick wasn’t exactly human. He watched her, and would have sworn the vampire muttered something around the lines of ‘So this was what they were talking about’ but was unable to truly understand, and before she had any chance of saying anything else Flick was speaking.

“You have no blood. Your flesh is cold. Your heart is silent. You are the living dead.” Her words were cold and hard, with more control lacing each sound than Eric had ever heard before. It was also the most perfect he had ever heard her voice. She never faltered, and she stared down at the vampire the way a master would look upon his aging slave. With sorrow and pain, and yet a morbid desire to watch them suffer.

He saw the vampire shutter for a split second, and then felt his heart stop as her head locked back into a morbid twisted position, her arms twisted behind her body and her wrists came together at the base of her spine and her entire body arched towards Flick. Flick’s eyes had narrowed on the creature on the ground before her; and Eric could hear the sickly deafening pops of breaking bone. He had to clasp his hands over his mouth to keep from screaming.

The vampire held her head back, and her body slowly fell in on itself. She never screamed, but her face cried out far worse than her voice ever could. Flick never flinched and held her steady slow pace until a gun shot rang out, and a bullet hole went clean into the vampire’s head. She dropped whatever control she had over her body, and the vampire fell limp against the ground; her skin already starting rot from the bullet hole and outwards until her entire body was black and disintegrating into dust.

Flick turned to see Cross standing next to her. He let out a deep sigh and took a swift swing with a flat hand to the back of her neck. Her eyes were wide for a moment, and then she collapsed. He caught her swiftly in one of his large arms before she hit the ground, and he turned one dark glance at Eric.

“Can you pick him up?” His accented voice was as heavy as ever, and he motioned towards Chris; who was out cold now against the ground.

Eric sat there stunned silent for a moment, and then nodded, going to pick Chris up.


They never told Flick the exact story, they all agreed it would be best; they also all agreed that they had to work hard to never let another situation like that occur again.


The first day of high school was hard for everyone; everyone in their small sized city knew of Flick’s year and a half in the hospital and all the teachers were over protective of her; every yawn sent up alarms and it was amazing they made it through the day without her being taken away for blood tests or something.

She had all her classes with both Chris and Eric this year; and didn’t mind the fact that the classes were too easy and rather boring, she was just glad to be with both of them. They all had lunch together and at the end of the day Cross picked them up and they went back to his apartment.

Throughout the year their extracurricular activities includes learning about all the different kinds of mortals and Flick taught herself perfect control, never again would she accidently put a command in her words. She also learned to use her mental blanket; the white field of the world around her she saw in her mind that let her pick out certain people based on the color of their dot.

She learned that blue were humans who knew about the supernatural world; Chris’s dot had gone from its boring pale green to blue when he had met the vampire. Hunters, such as Cross, were gray. Pure hearted immortals, such as Kuro, were pink; and dark hearted immortals were red. The darker the red the more powerful they were. Everyone else was a different shade of green; pale green were those without any special abilities at all, and the darker green the more powerful they were. She was never able to see her own dot.


Cross and everyone else were still butting heads. Flick stayed out of his way for the most part, but he never seemed to get over referring to her as some sort of weapon. He also never spoke of himself or why he was here; although he made it painfully obvious to everyone he would kill Flick the second the moment called for it.

Kuro stopped traveling into Flick’s dreams at night; and while he was never as cold as he had been towards her, they were never again as close. It was almost as if he was preparing for something he knew was going to happen soon.

Chris and Eric were as close as ever; and Eric had also gotten closer to Kuro. While Eric and Kuro were never best friends, Eric learned to let go of his obsession of Flick some; especially since she learned to take her blanket of control after him, she no longer needed it to feel secure and neither did he.

Both Chris and Eric learned to fight with weapons thanks to Cross; he refused to even speak to them until they agreed to learn; while Chris picked up the sword right away and fell naturally into the rhythm of using it like an extension of his own body, poor Eric couldn’t quiet seem to get a natural hold of anything so he made due with the gun, which was Cross’s weapon of choice. While Eric would never be as good as Cross he was decent and could hold his end in a battle against anything if he shot first.

Flick, on the other hand, was happy to stand in the back and use her powers of control; which she found out could control far more than she thought they could. Not only did her words have power over people, but she could also bend things such as elements; and even flesh and blood. This, however, she was never told…

Things in life were perfect for the first year of high school, and even well into the second year of high school; it wasn’t until Christmas did anything start to go wrong.