Narrative P. O. V.
Daniel and Jai walked in a drowsy daze down the stairs to the basement. Earlier, at around three in the morning, each of their phones lit up on their nightstands, summoning then down to the
basement.
They walked into the cold autopsy room where Cain stood between two metal examination tables. The two men on the examination tables had been cut into, their chests open and ventral sections of their rib cages removed to reveal dead organs.
Daniel and Jai both recognized the men as the one Jai had killed at Otto Müller’s funeral and the other as the man who had broken into the castle, nearly killing Ella.
“What do you want, Cain?” Daniel sighed, rubbing his eyes.
“What do you see when you look at these men?” Cain asked them.
Cain speaking in a normal speaking voice in the small, metal room made an echo that rung in Jai and Daniel’s tired ears.
“I see corpses who are getting more sleep than I am,” Jai muttered.
“You’re looking at Vampires who had once been human,” Cain said crossing his arms.
Daniel and Jai were suddenly very intrigued.
“Did you do this?” Daniel asked, gesturing to the bodies.
“Zosak helped,” Cain said.
“How do you know they were human?” Jai asked, walking up to examine the bodies himself.
Cain pointed inside the open chest cavity.
“Look at the decaying organs.”
Jai and Daniel each leaned in and saw that the organs were indeed shriveled and dead.
“You don’t think that it’s because they’ve been dead for nearly a month?” Daniel asked, pulling the collar of his t-shirt to cover his nose.
“No, this is years of damage,” Cain said.
“Whenever people are infected with Vampirism, their bodies die. The only thing that keeps them functioning is blood, but their body doesn’t process
it properly and their organs decay.”
“So what’s the point in drinking blood?” Daniel asked.
“Your body only needs red blood cells to survive.”
“So what’s the difference between a human who is infected and an infected Lycanthrope?” Jai asked.
“Vampirism eats away at the Lycanthrope gene. You lose the ability to shift when you’re turned. But, your body’s ability to regenerate cells and heal quickly means that your body doesn’t die, it just doesn’t operate normally.”
“So the organs don’t decay,” Jai said, crossing his arms. Cain nodded.
“How do you know they were turned and weren’t born with Vampirism like you were?” Daniel asked.
“Vampirism shuts down the reproductive system,” Cain said.
“If their mothers were Vampires, they wouldn’t have been able to conceive children.”
Daniel’s eyebrows knit together.
“Then how were you born half Vampire?” Cain sighed.
“The virus was dormant in my mother’s body because someone had tried to turn her years earlier. It didn’t quite take away her ability to have children, but the virus attached itself to her DNA and was transferred to me. The virus was somehow activated in me when I was born.”
Jai’s jaw dropped, having never heard the explanation for why Cain was the way he was.
“So that’s why you’re somehow pure blooded and a Vampire?” He asked
Cain nodded.
“But you can still shift?” Daniel pointed out.
“Lycanthropy is still my dominant gene,” Cain said.
“I still don’t follow,” Daniel said shrugging.
“But l’Il take your word for it.”
Cain rolled his eyes, wishing he had saved his breath.
“No matter how these men were infected with Vampirism, we still have an issue of humans being turned.”
Cain grabbed a steel scalpel from the tray beside the
examination table and used it to turn the corpse’s head.
On the side of his neck were two small. round scars.
“So the real questions are: why was a human-turned Vampire in Otto Müller’s casket? And why was one trying to kill Ella?” Daniel asked.
“He was trying to kill me,” Cain objected. “He didn’t know she was there.”
Daniel rolled his eyes.
“Fine… why was a human-turned Vampire trying to kill you?” Daniel corrected.
“There weren’t any other Vampires in the other missing men’s caskets,” Jai pointed out.
“So that means we have two distinct differences between Otto Müller and the other men: he only
went for one transfusion and one of these was waiting in the casket for his family.”
The whole room was silent as the three men stood in thought.
“Are we telling Ella?” Daniel asked hesitantly.
Cain sighed, running a hand along his jaw.
“I think it’s time you start being honest with her,” Jai said.
“She deserves the transparency and she needs to know what to expect if we find her grandfather.”
“You’re suggesting he’s been turned,” Daniel said.
Jai nodded.
“Fine,” Cain said. “I told her I’d talk to her this morning. I’Il bring it up.”
“You’re welcome for bringing her back by the way,” Daniel said, patting Cain on the back.
“What do you mean? I brought her back,” Jai said incredulously.
“I drove.”
“Who’s idea was it to stay at the airport and wait for her to change her mind?” Daniel asked rhetorically.
“We agreed on that mutually,” Jai argued.
Cain rolled his eyes.
“Tell Zosak we can burn these bodies tomorrow. Until then, I want you and Priya to take their DNA samples and see if we can get a rush on those identity matches for each of them.”
“Now?” Jai asked in disbelief.
“It’s four in the morning,” Daniel reminded Cain.
“And?” Cain asked.
“Priya is probably asleep,” Daniel said.
“So? Wake her up,” Cain said.
“I woke you up.”
Jai sighed.
“Wake her up,” Cain reiterated, walking out of the room.
“You can sleep when you’re dead.”
Jai and Daniel both looked at the corpses next to them.
Wonderful.