Bathory Blood

Petal's Run

Jock, George, and Frank thought all their Christmases had come at once as Petal lay before them, her short skirt ridden even higher up her thigh. George, though, was always the worrier, and things didn't seem right to him. He couldn't explain it, but he had a feeling in his gut that something wasn't right.

"I dunno, Jock," George stammered, making out like his jaw chattering was down to being cold and not because he was afraid.

"Stop shittin' your pants, George; she ain't nothin' but a cheap whore."

"I'm not. I'm just cold, that's all. I ain't never seen her before."

"That's because you don't look, George. But I do." Jock turned his part-toothless leer on Petal, who scanned this way and that, trying to find a way to escape. Bushes surrounded her, and the men were much faster and stronger than she was. She had no chance. Petal had been r***d before - it came with the territory in her line of work. Usually, it was just a customer who didn't want to pay after getting and eating what they ordered. This was different, though. She could tell that she likely wasn't going to be able to just get up and walk away after this one. "I seen her lotsa times."

"What are we waiting for?" Frank asked, impatiently thrusting his hand into his dirty jeans and massaging himself. "I'm gonna go first if this s**t takes much longer."

"The f**k you are," Jock warned, puffing out his chest.

"Well, get on with it then; afore I shoot in my pants," Frank whined. He knew better than to mess with Jock. Not even he and George together could take him. Especially as George was such a p***y. George was big and looked intimidating until he opened his dumb mouth and gave himself away. Most men would think twice about tackling George before he opened his stupid mouth. As soon as he spoke, it was clear to all what kind of man George was.

Petal scrambled until her back hit a tree, and she clawed at the ground, searching for some type of weapon but grabbing only a handful of dirt. She threw it anyway, and Jock screamed, reeling back as it hit him in the face. However, he was just kidding and grinned at her after making a fast recovery.

"It's gonna take more than a handful o' dirt to put me down, girlie," Jock warned. "If you wanna find out what it takes to get yuh golden gloves, just stand up. I'll give yuh a free lesson." Jock rolled his shoulders like a boxer. He'd been trained and could have been the champion of the world if he didn't get into drugs and prison. Every bum on the street has a success story, how they coulda been somebody if only misfortune hadn't struck, but in Jock's case, it was actually true. After he got out of prison, no promoter would touch him. Jock ended up on the underground bare-knuckle fighting scene where after one vicious beatdown after another, Jock finally killed somebody and ended up back inside. It was all downhill from there.

Petal knew better than to take Jock up on his offer. Not because she knew who he was but because she was surrounded by three men, and attempting to fight would only make things worse.

"C'mere," Jock growled and ripped her thin top from her. Before Petal could cover up, Jock had pinned her to the floor and was smothering her face, neck, and chest in kisses, dribbling and salivating over her as he went. He forced his fingers inside her but then suddenly stopped when he heard George scream behind him. "What the f**k, George?" Jock turned to find George on the floor with Femi standing above him.

"Sorry to break up the party," Femi snarled demonically as, with events difficult to compute, Jock, Petal, and Frank looked on. Femi dug his fingers into George's neck, and there was a loud slurping sound before he retracted them. He held something up in the air, and Petal screamed when she realized it was the inside of George's throat. The worst was still yet to come. Lifting the throat into the air, Femi lowered it into his mouth and sucked the blood from it.

Frank screamed and bolted. Jock hurried to stand and, by the time he did, he found that he was alone with Petal. A scream came from somewhere in the park. Jock looked at Petal with such terror that she almost chuckled. The evil sadist was gone and replaced with a little boy who wants his mommy.

"Who the f**k is that?" Jock asked, sure that Femi was there to protect Petal. Petal simply shrugged. She knew Femi, but she didn't know 'this' Femi. "What is he on, PCP?" Petal shrugged again, and Jock sighed impatiently as more of Frank's terrified screams filtered through the dense bushes. "f**k this." Jock made a run for it.

It felt good. So, so good to have the strength to pummel someone's face so much it turned to a mush of blood and bone. Poor Frank was unrecognizable but still alive. His breaths whistled through the gaps where his teeth were. The vampire blood was amazing. Ordinarily, he would feel at least some pang of guilt or pity for his victims, but with the blood, he just felt good. The more barbaric he was, the more his body responded, the more his blood pumped. It was better than any drug he had ever had.

Femi finished Frank off by biting out his throat and then gorging on the blood that spurted like a fountain from his severed jugular. As he drank, the feeling that coursed through his body was stronger than any MDMA. Femi felt so powerful that he considered himself a god. His senses were heightened to their fullest, and the sounds of heavy, panicked footsteps came to his attention. As he scanned the park, able to pierce the blackness as though it were day, Femi could clearly see that there were two runaways headed in different directions. He wasn't about to finish with Frank, at least, not until he had drained every last drop of blood from his body. There was no need to hurry as Femi knew where one of them lived, and she had to go back.

It drew some strange glances as, topless and her skirt hoisted to her waist, Petal sprinted the several blocks to her apartment. She'd given up smoking cigarettes several years ago and, although her lungs were much better, she still felt sick and could barely breathe as she stumbled into the dimly lit foyer of her apartment block. She closed the door behind her, feeling only a little safer now that somebody would need to be buzzed through to get inside. She bashed the button for the elevator but couldn't hear the familiar whir of the cogs and gears, so she assumed it was out of order again and began the long journey up sixteen flights of stairs to the eighth floor.

By the time Petal was halfway up, Femi, covered almost from head to toe in blood, stood outside the block. He had no intention of pressing buttons in the hope of being buzzed through; he was looking up at the open eighth-floor window of Petal's apartment, wondering if he could make it. There was no fire escapes outside the building; it was just a sheer front populated by large windows with ample ledges. Drinking a few pints of human blood had imbibed within Femi a sense that he could do anything, so he went for it and jumped. His first effort got him to the second floor, where he just missed grabbing hold of a window ledge and slid back to the ground with a frustrated yell.

Taking a run-up, Femi put as much effort in as he could and managed to leap as high as the third floor and, this time, grabbing hold of a window ledge by his fingertips. With his increased strength, it was no problem to pull himself up and then leap again. The next leap was done using only the power from his fingers, so it only carried him to the next floor, where he barely grabbed hold of another window ledge. With four stories to go, Femi regretted not trying the buzzer method first.

As he hung by his fingertips, looking at the sheer drop below, the thought occurred to Femi that the blood he had consumed wouldn't last forever and that if he had his ordinary human muscles working for him right now, he'd fall and die. This dreadful thought spurred him on, and he found the strength to climb.

Femi knew Petal would go back to her apartment because she had a five-year-old daughter, Rosie, who she doted on. Aside from her small h****n habit, everything Petal did, she did for her. She had lost her key, so Petal banged on the door until Keisha, a sixteen-year-old neighbor from downstairs, opened it.

"You OK?" Keisha asked, her eyes wide with fright as she watched Petal, topless and not looking good, close and bolt the door behind her.

"No matter who knocks," Petal could only point at the door and shake her head, but Keisha got it and indicated so with a jerking nod. "I lost my bag, I'm gonna have to owe you."

"No, it's fine. You look like you've had a hard time, girl."

"No," Petal insisted, "I owe you, you understand?" Keisha nodded, and, satisfied, Petal straightened out her skirt and put on a jacket before checking in on Rosie. Petal found her sleeping like a baby in her Barbie pink room. The scene calmed Petal somewhat, and she quietly closed the door, heading into the living room where Keisha had taken a seat on the couch, looking panicked. Petal sat in a chair opposite and breathed in and out as though monitoring it. Keisha didn't know whether to speak or not, so she remained silent.

The silence lasted for a few minutes until Keisha emitted a blood-curdling scream, her hand at her mouth, tears formed in her eyes as she stared at the window. It took her a while to get it, but Petal followed Keisha's gaze and saw, to her horror, that Femi was climbing through.

"Calm down, I just wanna talk," grinned Femi, covered in the coagulated blood of his victims and looking quite, quite insane.