I think I got the hang of snapping necks...or not? Was there any video on the internet about this? Was I using the correct technique? I suspected that I was sort of brute-forcing it rather than doing it correctly as I had seen in movies.

But then again, I didn't know if it was possible to do in real life or if it was one of those things that only happened in movies. Kinda like cars always exploding when they crashed, or guns only need to be reloaded when a scene called for dramatic tension.

These random thoughts floated around in my mind as I walked back to the store and the gas station using my phone to light the way.

The darkness and the whistling wind were creepy—which was weird to think. I was the monster around these parts. A dirty monster that needs to change.

My clothes and skin were crusty due to dried blood—some were mine because Action Hero did manage to shoot me. It felt like I had a mud mask applied all over my arms and abdomen. I wanted to take a bath so bad, but we were miles from my family's condominium in Las Vegas.

Good thing Deen brought a large jug of water with us.

Before we left her house, I was teasing her for her over-preparedness like we were going camping for a few days instead of going on half a day of driving. It turned out it was fortunate we had water with us. Mixing it with alcohol should be an effective way of wiping away all the blood since bathing was out of the question.

The cool wind that was soothing and comfortable earlier now made the ickiness of the blood covering me more pronounced. Or it might just be that it was too cold with my thin torn shirt. It was the feeling of an incoming stomach ache. The small hills behind me seemed to be blasting the wind straight at me.

Nearing the rotting store, I chased away my random musings and focused on the problems at hand: Deen, and these frat boys—both the living and the dead.

Deen was reliable...probably?

I hoped she restrained anyone trying to escape. It should be only Skull Tattoo Bro and that pathetic freshie left alive unless Action Hero had other friends hanging around. I'd have to think of a way to finish off the survivors that would be palatable to Deen.

Transforming back to Blanchette might be the way to go because she viewed us as two different people.

I was going to be very pissed if Deen was suddenly bothered by her conscience and chose to let Skull Tattoo Bro and the freshie go. Chances were slim that she'd be forgiving to them, maybe to the freshie, but she might deem death too much punishment.

She had a strong sense of justice. An annoying trait at times, but also occasionally useful as she defined her own justice and didn’t simply follow what was socially acceptable. Like she decided it was the right thing to help me, an Adumbrae, due to our friendship.

Deen wouldn't jeopardize our safety because of morality and pity, would she?

As for the dead bodies, I wasn't sure what to do with them.

They were Eloyce University students; a bunch going missing would be newsworthy. Furthermore, some of the frat boys were related to very important people, so the police would care about if they were missing. If only they were random nobodies, then this situation wouldn't be such a headache.

It would be easy to find the scene of the crime. My crime.

Let's see...if it were me—and I didn't have any knowledge of police methods—I’d track the last signal of the cellphones of these boys.

The police would most likely come upon the diner. From there, it was a simple matter of following the road. The interstate really didn't go anywhere else other than just fucking straight through the desert. This old gasoline station was along the way. Anyone with half a brain would search this place.

Oh well...impulsiveness.

It wasn't like I could turn back the time now.

Risk? Danger? I couldn't say I was prudent about stuff like that when I was still human.

But now, even less so.

It was just that...everything...everything around me, everything I had experienced since that fateful day at the Sanders Mall parking area, changed how I viewed the world.

I had fought, and sometimes killed, several Adumbrae, from normal to building-sized. Same with BID agents, mutants, and monsters, whatever those fuckers who trashed my condo building were supposed to be. I also met a couple of Corebrings. Death had come knocking at my door more than I could count.

Okay, I could count my near-death experiences, but they were so many times that the threat of death was becoming stale.

If the police showed up at my condominium in Vegas, suspecting me as an accomplice for the murder of these frat boys—they'd never consider my cute and pretty face to be the actual perpetrator—my reaction would be...seriously?

Just like how university life and careers, those normal stuff crap, were the furthest thing from my mind, I just didn't care about the mess I made here.

Which was bad.

Apathy could lead to death.

Fine. I should exert some effort cleaning this stuff up.

"Deen and I can probably come up with something since we're both intelligent girls," I said with an amused snort. Then I gagged as the strong smell of blood and funkiness of organs from the corpses inside the store wafted in my direction. Maybe I shouldn't have eaten a lot at the diner.

I stepped out from the side of the store and gazed at the gas station.

Beyond the pumps were two vehicles—the pickup truck of the creeper troop and the car of Action Hero. I could see them somewhat because the headlights of the sports car were turned on.

Against the lights was the silhouette of a woman. I couldn't mistake that figure for anyone else. And her blonde hair shimmered against the headlights.

It was Deen.

But what was she doing? She bent down and was dragging something on the ground. It was hard to tell because of the distance and a couple of pumps obstructing my view, but I think it was a body from its form. A dead one? Must be one of these ACO guys.

As she pulled it up, I became more certain that it was a corpse, or at the least somebody unconscious given its limply hanging limbs as she carried it to the passenger's side of the car. Passing by the left headlight, part of what I assumed to be the head of the body simply fucking fell off.

Fucking shit! Deen actually killed someone!

It wasn't a surprise that Deen killed a human because I knew she had done it before. Or rather, I was just assuming killed some of the 2Ms' goons that came for her the night my condo was attacked. That was a different scenario though. These guys were just innocent...well, not exactly innocent.

But they were far from armed men wanting to kill—hmm, they had guns and were going to do nasty shit to us. Not so different then. Huh, I really shouldn't be surprised Deen killed them.

She must've gotten all of them if she was moving leisurely, as leisurely as stuffing a corpse into a car could be.

We're partners in crime now, I happily celebrated in my head. It was one thing to hide a criminal family member or close friend—many would do that instinctively despite knowing it was wrong, especially if the criminal was an Adumbrae. It was a whole different matter to actually kill someone; that was an insanely huge leap that most people wouldn't take, even for a loved one.

But Deen did it for me.

She'd surely be a very, very loyal pawn. And useful too, especially with her Guardian Angel.

Elated with something finally going my way, I flashed my light around to see if I could find someone else Deen had killed. I wasn't sure who was the person she decapitated, but there should be at least one more person around here.

"Skull Tattoo Bro?" I whispered as I spotted a body lying by the entrance of the store. It had a familiar arm decorated with an ugly tattoo. "Well, well, what has Deen done to you?"

His face was unrecognizable—not that I could recall what he looked like. His features were rearranged by a powerful blow and obscured by blood, and his ankles were bound together by chains tethering him to a wooden post of the store.

Deen did this? She must’ve been really angry with him.

I looked over in her direction. She was pushing the red sports car with the dead body inside. Bodies. The driver's side of the windshield was covered with something that might be blood. She still hadn't noticed that I was already here.

As much as I wanted to be the one to beat up this bastard who insulted me, Deen probably had more right to his life than I did. If he was still alive.

I kicked him, but he didn't move. I stepped on his knee—it felt a bit weird like some stuff were out of place, loosely moving around—and put pressure on it. Gradually, I increased the force until I heard bones crack. Still no reaction.

Would someone unconscious wake up from pain? Someone under anesthesia wouldn't wake up if they were cut open during surgery. Although that probably didn't work the same way in this case.

I shone my phone's light on Skull Tattoo Bro's chest to check if it was moving. But since I couldn't really tell, I decided to kneel beside him to check. As I bent my knees, someone called out to me.

"Erind! Erind!" Deen exclaimed as she ran around the car. "Oh my god, you're back!" Her arms were wide open.

I wanted to avoid the impending hug but decided to give her this moment as a congratulatory gift. Her arms wrapped around me, and she held me close like we hadn't seen each other in years. I wasn't sure if she'd realize she was exerting a bit of her superstrength. "Agh, Deen, you're hugging me too tight."

"Sorry!" She loosened her hug. "Sorry, sorry. Did I hurt you?"

"No..." My head was bowed down, as if ashamed of what I had become.

When my arms could wiggle a bit, I hugged her back. Not as intensely as she did, but a hug nonetheless—she should know this was a big deal coming from me. I wanted to convey that she was the only one I could rely on. Deen was the type of person who wouldn't let anyone down, more so if they were desperately dependent on her. I should reinforce this personality of hers.

We hugged for several seconds. To me, who disliked physical contact, it seemed like millennia.

Fucking speak up! Come on, Deen! I raged in my head. I really wanted to break the hug, but I shouldn't be the one to interrupt a moment like this. A vulnerable and distraught Erind, that was me. An Adumbrae had just taken over my mind, I killed and ate several people, I was battling to keep my sanity, and I had no one else to turn to.

"Erind," Deen softly said. She stroked my hair to comfort me. "Are you, um, okay now?"

At fucking last. I feebly nodded like I was still recovering from the whole ordeal.

She held my shoulders and stepped back. Looking over my body, she said, "There's blood on you. Were you hurt?"

"They shot me...and that's why I turned to Blanchette...my anger." That wasn't exactly what happened, but it sounded cooler that way. I closed my eyes to seemingly push away bad memories.

"These tears on your shirt...did they do anything to you?"

I looked down. Right. I tore my shirt to look injured and helpless when I approached the backup frat boys. And now Deen thought that they assaulted me or something.

“No, no,” I said. “That’s not what happened. I tore my shirt when I transformed back to my original body. I was still struggling with the anger and rage in my mind and…and just sort of clawed myself as I tried to regain control.”

"I see. I'm glad you have turned back. Are you still feeling anything weird?"

"No...I don't think so." Then with a firmer voice, I assured her. "I'm fine. I'm in control now."

"That's good to hear. I was so worried about you."

"Deen, what do we do about...about all of this?" I whispered as I stared around in a bit of a panic, allowing my voice to rise in panic at the end.

"First, let's calm down." She patted my shoulder. Taking charge, as was the natural thing for her to do, she continued, "Let's check if everyone is accounted for. Six people were from the pick-up truck. Three from the red car. So that's nine in total, right? Can't believe I'm doubting my math for something so simple."

I weakly chuckled at her joke. "Yeah, there are nine of them I think." Action Man had one friend left by their car.

"How many did you kill—? No! Uh, I mean—"

"Deen." I looked up at met her eye. I gave her the most determined gaze I could muster, putting the facade that I trying to be strong. "I know what I did. Don't dance around the topic. This is my life now. I can't keep running away from it forever."

"Er...yeah." She faltered at my intensity.

"If I face reality, maybe I can control myself more," I told her. "So, yes. I killed them. Even though I had transformed, I can vaguely remember what was going on. The six guys from the pick-up truck entered the store. I killed two of them. Four escaped."

We reconstructed a timeline of events and confirmed that all nine guys were accounted for and dead. I gave her a sanitized version of what I could 'remember' while the Adumbrae had 'taken over' my mind. If I wasn't wrong, Deen probably wasn't telling me the complete side of her story either.

"They're all dead," Deen said. "Let's now decide what to do with—"

"Deen, wait a bit. Is he really dead?" I pointed at Skull Tattoo Bro. According to Deen, she hit his face with the shovel because he was screaming when Action Hero and his sidekicks arrived.

"I'm not actually sure," Deen said. "It doesn't look like he's still breathing."

Yeah, he's probably donezo, but I wanted to mess around with her a bit. "We should make sure," I said. It was easy for me to do it—just a quick stomp on his head. But I was interested in what Deen wo—Holy fucking hell!

She stomped on his chest with such force that it caved in. Several bones cracked like we were inside an ad on TV for the crunchiest chips. She removed her foot as blood soaked Skull Tattoo Bro's shirt. Some of his fractured ribs must've pierced through his skin when his chest got compressed.

"There," she said, giving me a reassuring smile. "He's dead."

Why the fuck did you do that? Was that supposed to make us closer by showing we were on the same boat with regards to killing people? "Ah...ye-yeah, he is," I stammered. Timid Erind face was my default since I wasn't sure how to react to Deen. And to think I'm supposed to be the not-so-normal one between the two of us.

"Anyway, let's go back to deciding what to do here," she said. "I propose we burn everything."