Day came, along with several headaches. Dominicus never thought he would have one in this day and age. Hangovers, however, were not usually accompanied by a tight feeling around one’s chest—and arms. And legs.

“You’re awake.”

He searched for the voice. His comrades were nowhere to be found. It was just him, a hole in the wall pouring sun on his face, and a whole lot of nothing in the room. The felt carpet was rough on his face—and arms, back, and legs. He had been stripped down to his underwear.

“Where… am I?” he finally said.

“5 Armstrong—I think,” the voice replied. It was a young man with some fun left in his life—was what his voice sounded like. He was facing away from him, so he couldn't see his face. Ridiculous. How could anyone have fun in this era?

Dominicus knew this street, however. He could escape and make his way back to their stronghold. “Thank you for telling me,” he replied. “It will be your demise.”

Every muscle in his body tensed until they tore and burned. The pain was fairly excruciating—but nothing too out-of-norm. Even so, he grunted from the burn.

It did nothing to free him from his restraints.

“How?!” His anger was palpable. There were few things in the world he couldn’t overcome with strength—granted, it was fairly difficult to snap an assault rifle in half. He could bend it, though.

“Simple engineering,” the youth replied. “I didn’t even need math or physics to figure it out. I just went and tied up a friend and got her to see if she could break out of it. I think we finally ended up at—8 loops of 14 gauge? An ordinary human being wouldn’t even be able to break out of a single loop of the stuff, really.”

“Eight… eight loops of stupid wire?”

“The one on you right now is at 15 loops. Coz engineering. Slap on a safety factor and all.”

Dominicus grunted once more, desiring to escape. He tore his muscles again and again, growing them each time.

“First, you kill my family, and then you kill their family?!” he snapped at the young man. His limbs were sweating blood by now, making him appear as a crazed wolverine.

“… Huh.”

“Shameless bastard! Don’t tell me you'll still deny it!”

“No, I’m genuinely confused—ah, I see.”

“Now do you realize your crimes!”

“I’m not a Hunter.”

Dominicus stopped squirming. Not a Hunter, he says, but we were obviously defeated. Instead, he rolled over, searching for the owner of the voice. He deemed eye contact important for this discussion.

There, James was sitting on a stool just past an open door. There was another person behind him, another youth projecting a broody aura that Dominicus found easy to respect. What caught his attention most, however, was their attire. It was nothing like what the Pasigueños used. Their long sleeves were plated with some sort of rigid armor, and where armor wasn’t a concern, they were packed with things of utility: pouches, blades, a pry bar for one, a utility roll for the other. There was a spear leaning against the doorframe—some kind of complicated-looking machete hastily attached to a deceptively-thin shaft.

The seated youth was hunched over, his hands clasped together in front of his mouth. His friend behind him was, at once, aloof and on-alert.

The two simply stared at Dominicus, allowing the silence to seep in. He had expected them to continue speaking, but he was the first one to break.

“Who are you?” he asked.

After three long seconds, James readjusted his posture, then stood up. He took the spear from the doorframe and entered the room, whereupon he just rested it against the wall.

“Rude,” he said. The tied-up vampire didn’t know what to reply.

“I’m the one tied up here and I’m the one who’s rude?”

“Said the one who was about to lay a hand on my friend.”

‘My friend,’ he said? “… Were they really your friends?”

“Well, one of them, at least. We just met the other one a few days ago. Takes a while to actually be friends, after all—we shouldn’t be taking friendships lightly, you know?”

“I’m doubting what I’m hearing.” Dominicus rolled away. He stared at the dead lightbulb in the ceiling. “Are you not afraid of us?”

“No. Why?”

“… I’m still doubting what I’m hearing.”

A new pair of footsteps came in—footsteps so light that Dominicus shuddered when a young woman spoke. “Better believe it. Asshole.”

“Don’t blame it on him,” James replied, but after Aurelia’s glare… “Maybe blame him by half.”

Aurelia sighed. “The others are okay. It’s just this guy for last.”

James shuddered. “T-that was fast. We’ll—I'll make you some coffee.”

He and Karlson hurried out of the general vicinity. Dominicus was still staring at the ceiling, still wedged in disbelief about whatever James had said and implied.

Lost in such thoughts, he received a sharp kick in the ribs that broke about half of them. He flew and rolled until the edge of the room, coming to a stop under the small window.

He looked up, and Aurelia stepped into the window's light. This was most definitely the woman he had attempted to force into their ranks. Those eyes of defiance were still there, but this time amplified by something much more sinister.

“We’re good friends, you know?” She paced up and down the room. “He's a little bit of an ass sometimes, but I’d rather take a hundred bullets for him than the other way around.”

“He’s… using you?”

For that remark, she kicked him against the wall, leaving a crack in the cement.

“Whoops, gotta respect the house,” she said, dragging Dominicus across the floor and back to the middle of the room. “Now, let’s have you apologize.”

Events had still left him in a daze. If they wanted to kill him, they probably could—but why weren’t they? “Why—why don’t you just kill me?”

“Kill you?” Aurelia laughed. “You didn’t plan on killing me either, right? This should be fair—though, you might’ve killed someone I actually liked. For that, I’ll need some… preventative measures.”

She took the spear that was still leaning on the wall and, not even hesitating, jabbed it into Dominicus’s leg. The pain was a slight bother—until she turned it on. It was like the hand of a titan squeezing his leg just before the point that it would pop. He resisted screaming for the whole of two seconds, then he broke. His cry resounded from the room, bothering Rose who was downstairs happily chewing away at a fudgie bar that Karlson gave her.

Aurelia stopped, removed the spear, and jabbed it into his other leg.

“Wait!” He gasped. “I don’t even know what you want!”

“I said it already. An apology.”

“I-I’m sorry!”

“For not listening the first time, here’s another free sample.”

His cry resounded once more. Downstairs, Rose couldn’t stomach it and stood up. Karlson followed her out to the backyard.

Aurelia removed the spear and rested it against the wall. She paced around Dominicus.

“It’s not quite the same, right? Being electrocuted, I mean.” She was making use of one experiment where James electrocuted himself with a stun gun, then got her to use a stun gun on herself so they could compare the experience. He owed her more than was originally agreed afterward. That, and the fact that the Bio-Police’s electrified machetes were designed to paralyze truly rabid Gammas—to deliver enough power to disrupt even the bloodlust of those monsters. Such a thing would kill an ordinary human being.

Dominicus was gasping for air, at his wits' end.

"I'm… I'm s—sorry…"

Aurelia squatted down beside him.

"Great!" she said with a smile. "Now we can be friends!"

What— "What do you… mean?"

"I'm not a fan of putting people through more pain than it's worth, honestly. And y'know what, I've heard from your buddies—you've gone through a lot, huh?"

Dominicus didn't answer. Whether it was the pain or the disorientation of what he's been hearing today, he was in too deep of a daze to feel like the same person that he was just yesterday.

Aurelia inched closer, as if telling a secret. "You're all still here because there's something here you can't leave behind, right? And you're the only ones who could fight to keep them safe, right?"

She was right.

"But the same people push you away. They're scared of you. The people you love are scared of you."

And it hurts as much.

"Why can't they just see that you're still the same?"

Why— "… why can't they?"

"Because you're not."

That's not—

"We're not human anymore. We all know that."

His face scrunched up. "So what are we supposed to do! Leave them?!"

"Whatever we had to do before we died—changed the moment that we did. Even I can't go back to my old place just yet. I'm afraid that they'll be afraid… Well, it's nice that I've still got friends, I guess."

"That's—answer my question!"

Aurelia pushed a button and the machete crackled momentarily, startling Dominicus.

"Say please," she said with a glare. Dominicus swallowed.

"… What are we supposed to do?"

Though he asked, her glare didn't let up, and she was quiet.

"… Please?"

She smiled.

"There's a man downstairs I'd like you to believe in."

"And… why?"

"His imagination isn't limited like us, but he's got the grit to see them through. Can you see it? Just talking to regular people on the way to the bakery? Can you see it happening again these days?"

"That's—that's not possible."

"Funny. I had you pegged down as a guy who goes all 'One day! If we keep fighting, then one day!' and all that bullshit."

He remembered, Yes, that was me. I said better words like that.

Aurelia stood up and patted herself down before dragging Dominicus by the arm and leaning him up against a wall.

"Must've been inconvenient having a conversation from the floor, huh?"

All he could reply was a dry chuckle.

"We've got a deal for you. What about it?" Aurelia continued.

"… I can't agree to what I haven't heard yet."

And he wasn't in a position to say no. On the other hand, clearly, they were intent on releasing him. What sort of deal did they have that would make them confident that he would keep up his end of the deal?

Aurelia chuckled as she leaned on the wall a good distance away from Dominicus. "True that. Well, in short, join me, and we'll make the world a more reasonable place."

Her wording seemed… off.

"Join 'you'?"

"Yeah. Me. Oh, my friend downstairs wanted to make something clear: we don't have an employer-employee relationship here, okay? We really are just friends."

—And because you're my friend, if you wanna do something, I'll be right behind you for it, too. So were James's words to her ears.

"This place isn't ready for you yet," she continued. "I'll give you a base far away from here. We'll have equipment and support. Follow my lead, and I'll make you all remember what normal feels like."

—No, I don't want to say 'Follow me, and you'll win'.

To lead down a warpath was an idea that scared her. Even if one day, they might have to fight one, there was always the last question of war: What happens next?

They could win. These were vampires, and they were powerful. They would definitely win—but only at the cost of their humanity. What happens after they win? Didn't they want to be accepted, not be shunned even more? They may be angry now, but once the anger dies, what would they do? What would they do with all their self-inflicted grief?

She may be lonely at times, thinking that she still had to sneak around Diliman just to see her friends, but at least she still had them. At least outside the fence, she could take a stroll with them and visit bootlegged versions of shops they used to know.

In those times, she wouldn't show her happiness—or is it more accurate to say that she didn't know she was happy. She wasn't jumping in delight, so it was easy to miss. Thinking back, however, and she was… at peace. That everything was just right.

These people didn't have that. She didn't know what she was taking for granted.

She had the opportunity: she had a base, friends with expertise, and above all, a personal glimpse of what being treated as a person was like. Someone like Dominicus—a name that his subordinates easily gave up within two zaps from a car battery—was a spark and fire for an all-consuming cause, but he ultimately didn't know the shape of the future he wanted.

Aurelia eyed the slump of a man, leaning against the wall, his mind half there and half not. It's sort of a wonder that getting beheaded and thereafter tortured with Thor's kitchen knife would reduce a man's resolve into this whatever-goop.

"By the way, I don't think I've heard an apology."

At the word 'apology,' Dominicus flinched, but saw that Aurelia wasn't poised to do any harm.

"What… do you mean?" he asked.

"It's not an apology if I force you to say it—or if you don't even know what you're apologizing for, huh? Fair enough, I guess…"

Dominicus couldn't understand this woman's ramblings.

"Well. Basically, you said he was using me." She paused to let the momentary anger settle from repeating those words. "It's like telling me my family doesn't love me, y'know? Though that might've been the case at some point…"

"But… weren't you just friends?"

"You know—Dominicus, was it? Any true family you can get your hands on is good. Fight for it, die for it—it's the only pain that's good enough to live for for simple people like us."

Dominicus chortled. "Simple people? You? After saying 'follow me' and all?"

Aurelia raised an eyebrow. "What? I felt bad hearing your stories and I decided to do something about it. Simple, right?"

Simple—but terrifying. Confront fear with courage and, better yet, several commissars called 'friends' and 'family' behind you, however, and it really is quite simple.

"Follow me, because I want to do something for all of you. You sort of insulted the same thing I wanted to let you all experience, though."

She produced a wire cutter and snipped off the wires binding Dominicus. He was surprised, even as she left him to fend off his thoughts by himself.

He could escape. He could. But he had been beaten to a pulp by a unicorn—she was someone who had aspirations beyond victory, and the reality she wanted was already reflected in a microcosm between herself and someone Dominicus should consider an enemy.

They were offered a base, and moreover, a change of pace for their fight—whatever their fight was about. The meaning of it had become lost on him.

Downstairs, James and Aurelia heaved sighs of relief as 90% of their guesswork turned out to be spot-on. Guessing the psychological profiles of their would-be opponents was no joke.

Variants of the first proposal—hazing the hell out of the prisoners—ended up being rejected about five times before being approved by the sixth.

To wear them down.

To make them receptive.

To be the spice to sweeten up the words.

Though they enjoyed their coffee now, James stopped slurping the moment Aurelia said, "… I kinda enjoyed it," thus ushering in her new awakening.