My Patients Are All Mythical Monsters

0029 — The Sterile Room

The silence in the kitchen wasn't peaceful. It was heavy. It tasted like ozone, burnt zinc, and the lingering, copper tang of old magic.

Victor Corvinus leaned against the granite counter, his legs feeling like they were made of wet cardboard. The adrenaline crash had hit him the moment the washing machine stopped spinning. Now, there was just the hunger. A deep, hollowing ache that clawed at his stomach lining, twisting his gut into a cold, hard knot. His hands shook, a fine, rhythmic tremor that he couldn't control.

He needed sugar. Fast. Or fat. Or anything that wasn't the metallic taste of his own exhaustion.

His eyes—heavy, gritty, burning as if he'd rubbed them with sandpaper—locked onto a plate on the far corner of the table. A ham sandwich. Stale. The bread was curling at the edges like old parchment, stiff and uninviting. The mayonnaise had turned a translucent, sickly yellow at the crust. It had been there since... Tuesday? Wednesday? It didn't matter. It was calories. It was survival.

He took a step toward it. His knee buckled slightly, the joint popping audibly in the quiet room. He grabbed the counter for support, his fingernails scraping against the cold stone.

"What have you done to her?"

The voice was low, sharp, and vibrated against Victor's skull like a tuning fork struck against bone.

Valeska stood by the washing machine, her hand resting on the pommel of her sword. Her silver armor, usually gleaming with the annoying brightness of righteousness, was dented. There was a smear of green slime across her breastplate—residue from the Sludge—and she smelled of wet dog and anger. She looked ready to kill. Or cry. Or both.

Victor didn't look at her. He couldn't. If he turned his head too fast, he knew he'd black out. He kept his eyes on the sandwich. "I cleaned her," he rasped. His voice was a wreck, a dry croak that hurt his throat. "Standard procedure. Post-op defragmentation. The spin cycle... it realigns the humors."

"She is... broken." Valeska pulled the vampire princess from the spin dryer.

Carmilla hung limp in her sister's arms. Her limbs dangled with the unnatural looseness of a marionette whose strings had been cut. Her eyes were open, wide and unblinking, staring at nothing. Her skin was pale, not the usual alabaster of the undead, but something translucent. Artificial. Like plastic wrap stretched too tight over a skull.

"She is rebooting," Victor lied. He forced his legs to move, dragging his feet across the linoleum. He reached for the sandwich. His fingers trembled, hovering over the crust. "Give her a minute. Her sensory input is... recalibrating. It's a lot of data. The detergent... the centrifugal force... it takes a moment to process."

Valeska drew her sword. The sound of steel sliding against leather was deafening in the quiet room. It was a sharp, singing note that promised violence. "You stole her glory. You turned a Blood Princess into a... a doll. A husk."

"I turned a walking biohazard into a functioning entity," Victor muttered. He touched the crust of the sandwich. It was hard as a rock. Perfect. He could feel the texture of the stale bread under his fingertips. "Put the sword away, Valeska. Unless you want me to charge you for 'Hazardous Waste Disposal' on top of the cleaning fee. And trust me, you can't afford my overtime rates right now."

"She does not move." Valeska shook Carmilla. The younger vampire's head lolled back and forth, loose on her neck. Her hair, usually a perfect cascade of silver, was frizzy with static electricity. "She does not speak. You have lobotomized her. You have stripped her of her instincts."

"It's called 'peace and quiet'," Victor said. He lifted the sandwich. It felt heavy, like a brick of salvation. "Enjoy it while it—"

The air buckled. A soundless implosion, like a soap bubble vanishing.

There was no explosion. No flash of light. Just a sudden, absolute absence of matter.

Victor blinked.

The sandwich was gone.

Not dropped. Not eaten. Gone.

In his hand, he held a plate. On the plate, there was a fine, grey dust. It looked like ash. It smelled faintly of ozone and disappointment.

Victor stared at the dust. The hunger in his stomach turned into a cold, void.

"My lunch," he whispered. The tragedy of it was absolute.

"Victor!" Valeska stepped forward, the sword tip hovering inches from his chest. The steel was cold; he could feel the chill of it through his shirt. "Explain! Why is she—"

Carmilla moved.

It wasn't a human movement. It was a glitch. One second she was limp; the next, she was standing perfectly upright, three feet away from Valeska. Her posture was rigid, unnatural. Her spine was a straight line.

Valeska froze. "Carmilla?"

The younger vampire didn't answer. She tilted her head. Her eyes, usually a deep, predatory red, were now glowing with a faint, clinical blue light. She scanned the room. The fridge. The stove. The floor tiles. Her gaze moved in sharp, grid-like patterns.

Then, she looked at Valeska.

"Left pauldron," Carmilla said. Her voice sounded like grinding glass. It was devoid of emotion, devoid of recognition. "Micro-fissure. Seventeen millimeters. Structural integrity compromised."

Valeska blinked. "What? Sister, speak to me."

"Bacterial colony detected," Carmilla continued, her tone flat, monotone. She pointed a pale finger at Valeska's shoulder. "Staphylococcus aureus. Four hundred million units. Breeding in the sweat residue under the leather strap. Exponential growth rate. Disgusting."

The temperature in the room hadn't dropped, but the hair on Victor's arms stood up. He smelled liquid nitrogen. A phantom scent that coated the back of his throat.

*System Alert: Subject 008. Mode: Safe. Status: Hyper-Sterile. Do not engage. Do not breathe.*

"She is speaking in tongues," Valeska whispered, backing away. She lowered her sword slightly, confusion warring with her aggression. "You cursed her. You put a demon inside her."

"I... upgraded her," Victor said, staring at the dust on his plate. He licked his finger and touched the ash. It tasted like carbon. "Carmilla, stand down. That's an order. Or a suggestion. Please."

Carmilla ignored him. She took a step toward Valeska. Her nose twitched.

"Sebum accumulation on cervical collar," she recited. "Fungal spores. Class C. Dead skin cells. Estimated weight: 12 grams. Hazard level: Moderate."

"Stay back!" Valeska raised her sword again. "I do not know what you are, but I will cut you!"

Carmilla looked at the sword. "High-carbon steel. Rust oxidation on the fuller. Tetanus risk: 89%. Inefficient. Dirty."

She moved.

It was faster than a blink. Carmilla didn't lunge; she simply ceased to be in one spot and appeared in another. She was at the sink.

She grabbed something.

Victor squinted. "Is that my toothbrush?"

It was. The red one. The one with the bristles splayed out like a palm tree because he'd been too cheap to buy a new one for six months. It had seen better days. It had seen terrible days.

Carmilla held it like a holy relic. Like Excalibur. She inspected the bristles.

"Purification required," she stated.

"Carmilla, no!" Valeska shouted.

Carmilla attacked.

She didn't bite. She didn't scratch. She scrubbed.

She tackled Valeska, pinning the armored knight against the refrigerator with impossible strength. The impact dented the stainless steel door. The toothbrush became a blur of red plastic.

The sound of cheap nylon bristles grinding against ancient, holy steel filled the kitchen—a rhythmic, abrasive rasp that set Victor's teeth on edge.

"Get off!" Valeska shrieked, dropping her sword. The weapon clattered to the floor, useless against this assault. "It tickles! It burns! Get off!"

"Filth!" Carmilla screamed, her monotone breaking into a hysterical, high-pitched wail. "Grease! Dead skin! Mites! It's all over you! It's crawling! Why are you so loud? Why are you so dirty?"

She jammed the toothbrush into the joint of Valeska's elbow armor, scrubbing furiously. Foam—where did the foam come from? Maybe it was saliva, maybe it was magic—started to bubble around the bristles.

"I am a High Auditor of the Crimson Court!" Valeska braced her boots against the floor tiles, her gauntlets hovering over Carmilla's shoulders, trembling. She could have thrown the girl through the ceiling with a twitch of her muscles. She *wanted* to. But Victor's warning about 'structural integrity' paralyzed her. If she used even a fraction of her strength, she might shatter the fragile, plastic-wrapped doll her sister had become.

"You cannot do this! It is undignified!" she shouted instead, choosing humiliation over accidental fratricide.

"Dignity is clean!" Carmilla hissed. She grabbed Valeska's helmet and started scrubbing the visor. "You are covered in particulate matter! You are a walking petri dish!"

"Victor!" Valeska kicked, her metal boots denting the cabinet doors. "Help me! She is trying to... to exfoliate me to death! She is insane!"

Victor stood by the counter. He looked at the chaos. The vampire princess, possessed by the spirit of a violently OCD cleaning lady, assaulting her sister with a dollar-store toothbrush. The noise was incredible—the screech of plastic on metal, the grunts of exertion, the screams of indignity.

He looked at the ash on his plate.

He sighed. A long, rattling exhale that emptied his lungs.

"Iron-Jaw," he called out, his voice flat.

The ghoul stepped out of the shadows of the pantry. He was holding a toilet brush. He looked from Carmilla to Victor, his yellow eyes wide with confusion. He held the brush up, offering it like a weapon.

"Don't," Victor said. "Put it down. We don't need a platoon."

Iron-Jaw lowered the toilet brush, looking disappointed. He grunted, a sound that sounded suspiciously like a question.

Victor picked up the empty plate. He brought it to his mouth and licked the grey dust. It was dry. Chalky. It tasted like static.

"Victor!" Valeska yelled, her voice muffled as Carmilla tried to scrub her face. "Do something! Command her!"

Victor chewed on the nothingness. He swallowed. It didn't help the hunger. It just made him thirsty.

"That's extra," he said to the room. "Deep cleaning. It's a premium service. I'll add it to the bill. Labor, materials, emotional distress."

He turned and walked out of the kitchen. He needed to find a vending machine. Or a rat. Or just a dark corner to pass out in until the world made sense again.

Behind him, the scrubbing continued.

The rhythmic rasp of the toothbrush against metal followed him.

And the screaming.

It was music. Expensive, billable music.