Second Nature

Blake’s P.O.V

The next morning I woke to a very warm bed. I rubbed my eyes whilst yawning and sitting up slowly stretching before I noticed I was in Frank’s bed still. “Shit.” I mumbled looking round to make sure I’d not complicated things by doing something ridiculously stupid. “We didn’t.” I heard his voice come from his bathroom door, where he was leaning against the door frame in just a pair of boxers. “We talked about, you felt dizzy and sleepy from me taking the connection out of you. I went down to get a drink and by the time I got back you was fast asleep. I took your dress off and put one of my shirts on you and tucked you in, when I got in you cuddled up to me and seemed to be calm so I didn’t move away.” He smiled as he walked over to his wardrobe as I took the information in. “Oh, uh thanks?” I mumbled, cursing at myself when he caught me staring. “I thought maybe today, I could teach you our ways? You know so you can learn what you’ve been missing out on?” He turned to face me as he slipped the Green Day shirt over his head. “I’d like that, let me get freshened up?” I smiled standing up, blushing when I noticed how short his shirt was on me.“Well how about I meet you in the kitchen when you’re ready, I’ll make breakfast for us both.” I nodded as I stuck my head out of the door making sure there was no one in the hallway. I closed the door quietly and padded my way down towards my room when I heard a familiar cough come from behind me.“I know that sneaky sneaky walk. You spent the night.” I heard the smirk in Anna’s voice before I even turned to face her. “No. Well yes. But not in the way you think!” I reprimanded her for thinking such things, “I fell asleep on his bed.” I told her truthfully as she cocked her eyebrow up at me. “And you happened to be in his shirt? Curiouser and curiouser.” Her smirk grew as I rolled my eyes. “No he changed me into this whilst I was asleep if you must know misses!” I laughed as she did her disbelieving look at me. “Anyway I gotta go get changed, maybe we can talk later? I have a feeling we will need to.” I smiled a little at her before walking back down the hall as she called out playground songs of Frank and I kissing in a tree.

I made my way downstairs and to the kitchen once I’d had a quick shower and changed into sweatpants and a simple vest top. When Zack used to want to teach me anything it usually involved a work out and I quickly learnt that he never gave you the option of changing. “Why do you look like you’re preparing for battle? I thought we had kind have made peace a little.” Frank laughed as he drink from his coffee mug. “Well I didn’t know what exactly you meant by teach me. This is my usual uniform.” I laughed a little blushing. Obviously Frank wasn’t going to teach me fighting techniques, I’d never even seen him lift a finger so I highly doubted he could fight. He was probably like Zack and had youngers to do it for him. “We’re not going to be fighting or working out if that’s what you mean.” He laughed as he handed me a plate of waffles and fruit which I eagerly tucked into as he watched. “I thought we could start with the basics.” He continued to watch me as I nodded still diving into my waffles. “I know that the peers have the ability to kill those that wrong, intentionally harm or are a glitch. I know that for what I’ve done the peers will surely skip the whole procedure of a meeting and just fight between themselves to kill me. I know you and Gerard are peers. I know you’re pretty fucking old.” I smirked with that one, “I know we all have individual abilities as well as the generic ones. I know you inherit traits from those who turn you.” I bit my lip as I realised I’d never recognise who it was that turned me. “You know the basics then. I assume you know your power is the ability to stop time?” He looked at me, with the hint of pride on his face.“I don’t stop time, I slow it right down. If I stopped time you wouldn’t be able to hear me or I wouldn’t be able to manipulate objects, like I did with the bottle.” I tried not to show the smirk, but even I was proud of that one!“That was pretty impressive.” He laughed, “even if Gerard got hit in the face.” I smiled when I realised he was being geniune. I quickly finished up my waffles and put the plate in the kitchen sink before turning to him. “So what don’t I know?” I questioned slowly as I followed him out of the kitchen and towards the front door. “I need to know why you didn’t disappear with Anna at the bar.” He looked at me slowly, before disappearing and reappearing at the bottom of the stairs, leaving me at the front door. He quickly held his hand out for me to take. “Is it because you don’t like doing it,” he looked at me leading me down the stairs “or because you can’t?”“I can’t.” I bit my lip following his lead, “my boss tried to teach me.” I flinched at the memory, “he tried really hard. But I just couldn’t do it. He had me tested and it turned out that, that part of my brain hadn’t fully adapted and I was cursed with the inability.” I shrugged.“He had you tested?” He spoke out in disbelief stopping in front of me, “tested how Blake?” He turned my chin to look at him.“He had some blood taken from me and a little cut here and there to examine it.” I shrugged not wanting to alarm him. “If I ever find out who this boss is, it won’t be the peers who kill him.” He snarled as his fangs fully extended poking into his bottom lip. His eyes flashing a dangerous red. I bit my lip, those butterflies coming back to dance around. Why did he care?

“Ok so it’s obvious you didn’t know about the connection before last night so maybe I can explain it more?” He spoke after a while of silence whilst we walked around the beautiful grounds.“That would be very helpful.” I smiled looking up at him. “When two of our kind have a close relationship then supposedly as protection they create a connection. This connection allows them to understand each other on a deeper level, it allows for the senses to be filled with each others. So they feel, see, smell and taste what the other does in certain situations.” He glanced at me to make sure I was still following, which I was. Just. “You know how they are created but they can be mutual. Which means that they drink from each other. Its the sort of thing humans would call blood brothers but with a lot stronger meaning.” He laughed a little. “But that doesn’t mean you can’t create that for a human. I must admit I was amazed that you hadn’t created one with Anna but now I understand why.” I sat down on the little incline of grass that was next to us. “I never created one with my boss.” I looked at him slowly. “He never let anyone feed from him, he always fed from us.” He nodded as though he knew. “Just like he never fought?” He spoke slowly, as though he was scared of offending me. “Just like that. Before I came on this job I had two terms left before I was up for the option of leaving. I made him deal if I beat him at a two and a half minute battle then I could choose. He lost but said if I completed this then that would be it I would be able to go.” I leaned back and looked up at him, “you was my last one.” I laughed before looking up at the sky, realising how much I missed it.“Well think of it this way. You’re never going back there.” He smiled looking down at me as I laughed. “Yeah cause I’m going to be dead.” I laughed closing my eyes. “Blake I need to ask again, why don’t you heal like our kind?” He whispered, resting on his arm so he was facing my but still above me as he stroked my cheek with his other one as I closed my eyes. “I’m still part human.” I breathed out as I looked back up to him, “I don’t heal like a vampire but I don’t die instantly like them either. It’s like I’m in limbo between both alive and dead.” I took his hand and slide it down my chest to where my heart is as I slid my other hand down to his. “You see the difference?” He nodded as he felt the beating of my heart as I felt nothing from his. “So when silver touches my skin it’s agonising because it’s only fighting the vampire cells in my body, but my human cells are fighting the vampire cells.” I whispered. “I bet you wondered why I chose to carry on my allegiance to my boss, but the truth is he had the excuse to kill me. You see I am the glitch that the peers fear so badly. When he realised I was a glitch his henchmen were just about ready to do that but he stopped them. He spotted the perfect assassin. How can the target sense a fellow vampire when she has a heartbeat?” I whispered, trying to hold my tears in. “Blake. That’s not what the peers fear. They fear the rogue glitch, the glitch your boss wanted you to be.” He stroked my cheek again, “the glitch that they created. Not the one who lived in fear each day.” He kissed me softly and gently, before I pulled him deeper into it making it become more heated and needed. “Zachary Quinn.” I whispered on his lips, before I flipped us over and down the hill just as we heard the loud bang and the crack from the wall being penetrated.

Notes