The second it hit my tongue, all other senses were drowned out. The blaring EDM from the speakers faded into a muffled hum. The humidity of the densely packed rave was replaced with a soothingly cold breeze with every drop. The epilepsy-inducing lasers darkened as my eyes fluttered shut. I gripped the shoulders of the stranger before me tightly, blissfully ignoring their wildly inappropriate noises - at least the sounds were the only uncomfortable thing about doing this, for me.

  London tugged me back by my waist, and I groaned at the loss of the blood. She grabbed my wrist, silently telling me to get it together. With a reluctant sigh and a clearing head, I licked my thumb and swiped it over the dazed stranger's wound. Their tissue and skin quickly began to repair itself. The blood lingering on their skin hardened and flaked away in the wind. I watched the poor woman sway on her feet as she forgot I was even there, and that any of that had just happened.

  London span me around and glared at me.

  "I said a sip!"

  "I sipped!" I pouted, my voice rather whiny thanks to the increasing intoxication of fresh blood.

  "You gulped." She muttered.

  "Well, you do it, then!" I huffed. "I can't really measure it"

  She raised a brow, unsure if I knew that sounded dumb.

  I rolled my eyes. "It's loud. I don't like it here. I wanna go home."

  "If you go home, you have to deal with Victoria."

  I let out a bigger whine at that.

  "Why'd she.. fuckin'... do that shit, huh?" I struggled to keep my eyes focused, falling drunker with every passing second. "She was like.. 'oh, heyyy! I missed you, Zachy. Lemme just.. give you a good ol' kiss, yeah? Cos that's never ended up badly before!' God. The bitch."

  "You've given me this rant eight times tonight." London deadpanned. "It's been a week, almost. You really need to get over it."

  "If a corpse kisses me, is that.. is that necrophilia? Reverse necrophilia?" I continued to ramble. "Or is it not, cos I didn't consent?"

  "I- what?" She cringed. "Uh- she was basically no different to you at the time; it's not necrophilia for you to kiss someone, so why would it be-"

  "Well, duh, cos I'm not dead."

  "... Zach. You are."

  "Noooooo. No not like dead-dead. I was only dead for a few seconds. I'm... I'm not a corpse. Tori's a corpse. She rots and shit. Her eyes are white. Her skin's kinda blueish. I... I think she's a zombie."

  "Yep. That's enough."

  London took my wrist and guided me through the tight crowd of drunk, high, and tempting humans. I frowned as we passed by two people who were yelling at each other, one of them pulling her hair up into a ponytail and ready to fight.

  How could anyone argue here? They're playing David Guetta.

  "Do you think my blood tastes like everyone else's?" I attempted to make conversation as London pushed us past more people.

  "What? To... To me or to you?"

  "Tastes like shit to me. But do you think you'd taste a difference?"

  "In what situation would I ever have the slightest damn idea?"

  "I dunno. Just wondering. Jeez."

  "You've been sober from this for way too long." she sighed. "You don't even remember how to be high anymore."

  "Yes I do! I have my rules." I grumbled in protest, despite struggling to jog my memory. "I gotta make sure my teeth are straight, gotta make sure I don't get mad, and... like... uh..."

  "Make sure you don't kill anyone?"

  "Yeah. That."

  As we finally passed a barrier gate, Hunter and Malachi joined us, having been waiting there for us for longer than they should've. Hunter didn't even look at me. He had one hand fidgeting with one of his hoodie strings, and his other holding a beer. Malachi, on the other hand, took hold of my free wrist to give London a break from babysitting me. London nodded to him and moved to walk beside Hunter as we headed to the carpark. I frowned.

  "Why's everyone mad at me?"

  "Don't start." Hunter muttered bitterly.

  "I didn't do anything!" I continued.

  Malachi gripped my wrist slightly tighter. "You were meant to be home an hour ago. Carly's been worried sick, blowing up our phones. She's convinced herself that Tori's gonna kill her in her sleep."

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  "Well, why doesn't she just smoke silverleaf in her room to keep Tori away from her?" I retorted, the sting in my voice a little too obvious. "She clearly knows how to use the stuff."

  London winced slightly at the reminder of what she and her twin had done to me.

  "Why bother with the suicide shit?" Hunter blurted, unable to keep it in anymore.

  I shot him a look, pushing for him to elaborate.

  "You're immortal. Get used to it." he brushed a hand through his light brown hair in an attempt to calm down. "Doesn't have to be a cut to be self harm."

  I clenched my jaw, my eyes burning into him. Before I could respond, Malachi spoke instead.

  "He means to say, starving is stupid. Your self destruction doesn't impact you as much as it impacts everyone else. We always have to pick up the pieces, and then you go and do it again."

  "Guys, don't be selfish." London furrowed her brow.

  "Tell that to the guy who used to ditch school every morning because he'd be too hungover from spending his nights drinking from hookups!" Hunter growled.

  I flinched at the memory of my old habits. That wasn't even long enough ago for me to excuse it.

  "This is better. There's way more people here, it's outdoors, and there's already destined to be a hundred people with weird injuries by midnight." Malachi spoke firmly. "Everyone's high enough to not think anything's off."

  "He overdid it." London blabbed. "He came in here barely agreeing to one person, yet I had to drag him away from his eighth."

  "Eighth?!" Hunter's eyes snapped wide. "That's like... what, a couple glasses worth?"

  "Uh, probably just over a litre, going from his old system." Malachi shrugged. "Could've changed, but he used to take I think 150mL on average from each person when we used to do this?"

  "He took too much the last few times. Like a lot." London murmured.

  "Mm. Maybe two litres." Malachi dug his nails into my skin subconsciously.

  I winced at his grip and growled at him. "Dude! I can walk on my own!"

  "I'm sure." his tone was dead flat.

  Being thrown up onto the back of the ute felt humiliating. The illegally placed seatbelts on the floor of it wrapped around my chest, waist, and ankles, leaving me lying there out with nothing to do but stare up at the dark sky. I hated this stupid rule. One time - one time I tried to attack Hunter while he drove us home from a feeding night, and ever since, I'd gotten the mental hospital treatment. Sure, laying down like this meant no other drivers could see me and call the cops, so I could understand that, same with having me separated from the others, but being strapped down? Irritating at best.

  Malachi switched on the small lantern that was tied beside me to give me enough light to counteract the effects that darkness had on me. At the rave, the flashing lights had kept me somewhat sane, but we'd be driving for long enough for that jet black sky above to tempt me. At least my prison wasn't psychological this time.

  I spent the first half hour just thinking, processing, and grieving. There wasn't much else to do but slowly sober up. Though as the drive continued, my enhanced hearing started really pissing me off, forcing me to listen to the others having their fun and listening to music from inside the car. They even played I-spy. Like kids.

  I couldn't help but reflect on how isolated I'd always felt with them, no matter how close we were. When Tori died and came back, and I ghosted everyone, I thought it would be hard. Thought I'd be lonely with no one to really talk to. But instead, I realised that I felt just as lonely when I'd be in the same room as them. Human me never felt like that. Human me never had a reason to be isolated from his friends. I had to let go of the train of thought, or I'd fall into a rabbit hole of resentment towards my vampirism that I really didn't wanna go down at the moment.

  I was set free after we arrived to a gas station a few minutes from my place. They made sure to park in the trees just before the station so that no one would notice me being unstrapped from the back of the ute.

  "Can I get these?" I murmured to London as I picked up a box of iron tablets from one of the shelves.

  She shot me a weird look and shook her head. "I think you're fine."

  While the guys gathered firewood and other campfire supplies, which was making me mentally freak out, London and I were on snack duty. I honestly couldn't remember how most of what was before me even tasted like, so I found myself more interested in the other isles.

  "Uh, hey, does Victoria need any?" London tapped my shoulder and gestured to the menstrual product section.

  I frowned.

  "No? I don't think she'll ever need them." I brushed the back of my neck. "I mean, yeah she's not quite as turned as me, but most of my reproductive functions shut down after I was turned."

  "Oh. Right."

  Another customer came in, and I didn't pay any thought to them, until I picked up the scent of their blood. My ears pulled back, my nose twitched, and I stood fully straight to get a glimpse of them from above the isles.

  It was a woman. Maybe late teens, early twenties. Her freckled skin was slightly tanned, and her long dark brown hair cascaded over her shoulders in gentle waves. Her outfit was slightly too revealing for your average post-midnight 7/11 run, so there was a good chance she'd just been at the rave, too. I'd never seen her before, but something about her was... eerily familiar. Her blood smelled of jasmine and peony. I only knew one person whose blood was like that.

  "I need to go home." I whispered, frozen in dread and confusion.

  "What? What's wrong?" London whispered back, following my gaze and not understanding what the problem with the girl was.

  "Either it's the blood or the adrenaline or the darkness. Something's fucking with my head. I wanna go home. Now."

  "Zach, can you explain for once in your life?"

  "She smells like Tori." my voice cracked at the very words. "Human Tori."

  London fell silent and looked to the girl again. She tilted her head and narrowed her eyes as she scanned the stranger over.

  "She looks nothing like her. Same taste in shoes, I guess." she shrugged. "Tori's at home asleep, according to Carly."

  "London, I've... never met anyone like her before. I didn't think there were others."

  "It's probably a blood type thing. Maybe Tori has a rare type, and this girl has the same one."

  "Tori's B positive. Not that rare."

  "Uh- how do you even know that?!"

  "Shh!"

  I crept around the corner and into the same isle as the girl, trying my hardest to seem indifferent. I studied a few products before me, stealing the occasional side glance to her. She was more tense than I was. Her hands were holding onto a packet of 2 minute noodles so tightly that I heard a few crack. Her gaze was locked on a random spot on the shelf. She gulped.

  I narrowed my eyes.

  "Do I know you?" I blurted.

  "Zach!" London whispered, facepalming.

  The woman met my gaze for a split second before looking away again. Her eyes were like sapphires, just like Tori's used to be.

  "I don't think so. Sorry."

  Her voice was different than I'd expected. She took her items and approached the checkout, eager to get away from me.

  I turned back to London, my heart pounding.

  "What the hell was that about?" she huffed, walking over to me.

  "I... I don't know. I think I scared her. Maybe I was just hallucinating."

  "Maybe." London sighed, exhausted. "You do look a bit like a junkie right now."

  "You're so kind to me." I mocked with an eye roll, heading over to the guys.

  "You need a shower, too. You reek of blood."