Chapter Twelve: Morale Check

When the little phone buzzed, Verne was supposed to answer its call immediately. That was the pronouncement that Erasmus Moody had made, and Verne suspected that the vampire would brook little disobedience. Even so, Verne stared at it angrily for a minute before picking it up and unlocking the screen.

He hated being beholden to Juvechrome, Glossa, or the vampire coven... or whoever it was that Erasmus was acting on behalf of. He hated that he now had to carry around a little device that, for all he knew, was recording his location and everything that went on around him. He couldn't wait to get the vampires and their 'smart thingamadoodle' out of his un-life. It was a bit surprising, then, that the first message he received on the device was both welcome and helpful.

C: <Use this coupon code to purchase the linked ebook. It should prove useful. -CB

CB was Charles Barrett, who was a familiar, Erasmus's personal assistant, and some kind of junior executive at Juvechrome. Verne wasn't sure whether he should like Charles for being so unfailingly polite or hate the man for being so cheerful while working for such a horrible man. He followed the link to an eBook site selling a digitized copy of 'Ghastly Spires', a niche role-playing game that had been first and last published in 1983.

A quick glance at Ghastly Spires revealed its use: it was a role-playing game all about vampires. The vampire community had, apparently, published the volume on the sly amid the era of the 'Satanic Panic' of the '80s, as a way of getting information out to vampires and their allies without causing much alarm. Given the literally hundreds of fictional vampire rules, nobody would ever pick an out-of-print, never-popular role-playing game as the holy writ of vampire lore. But there it was, in digitized grayscale: Ghastly Spires – A Game of Vampyres, Their Minions, and Their Enemies.

The book was 155 pages, but only about a third of that was relevant to Verne's situation. Whether the other two thirds was just filler or informative about the greater supernatural world in which he apparently lived, Verne couldn't say. He copied the eBook to his tablet to take advantage of the larger screen and got to reading. Some of the information was valuable, some merely interesting, and some so horrible it sprung him into action.

~A vampyre can attempt to create a familiar with a Small Bite of venom. The chance of successful creation is a successful Influence roll starting with a –6 penalty and gaining a +1 bonus for each bite after the first bite. Vampyres have +8 Influence over their familiars, allowing all but the least influential vampyres to expect unquestioning loyalty from their minions.

~Each vampyre is subservient to its Master vampyre – the one who created it. A Master vampyre has +4 Influence over its children vampyres, as does the Master's master, etc. All other vampyres higher up in the same lineage receive +2 Influence.

In other words, vampires could create loyal familiars with small doses of venom, and those familiars would display great loyalty. Conversely, vampires were loyal to whatever vampire created them (and whatever vampire created them, etc.), albeit to a lesser extent. Verne wondered what that meant, as he didn't have a clue whose venom he'd injected himself with (and if you'd given him any name other than Erasmus Moody, he'd have no idea who you meant). There was also useful information about vampire weaknesses:

~Vampyres are massively strong and fast, receiving a +6 to all physical stats and a +2 to base Influence due to physical beauty. However, the curse of vampirism also incurs many weaknesses that vampyres must be wary of:

• ~Direct sunlight incurs 1d4+1 points of physical damage per minute. Indirect sunlight will incur only 1 point of damage per minute of exposure. Artificial ultraviolet light of high intensity will also cause 1 point of damage per minute. A vampyre with Ultra Healing may offset 1 point of sun damage per minute. In addition, vampyres without eye protection are Dazzled by sunlight and suffer –4 to all combat and skill rolls. Vampyres who are Sated on blood suffer only –2 when Dazzled and take half damage to sunlight.
• ~Holy places and holy signs incur 1d4 of morale damage per minute. Unwelcome places incur 1 point of morale damage per minute. A vampyre who suffers morale failure can be considered Panicked until morale is restored above 1 point.

In other words, what Verne already knew about sunlight... though, he suspected, he must have Ultra Healing (if not all vampires did), because he didn't suffer anything substantial in the shade or when it was cloudy outside. Plus, if he'd recently had blood, he'd be able to stay out longer and/or suffer less damage. The second bit also explained why he felt the way he did in church and felt the need to be welcomed into places. Obviously, the role-playing game's numbers were metaphorical, but their meaning was clear enough to be useful. There was a third weakness listed below those:

• ~Many mortals would rather die than become a vampyre, for the Curse of Vampirism is a strong one. Not only must the vampyre consume 2 points of blood every 2 days, else they suffer progressively from Ravening / Vampiric Insanity, but they cannot enjoy any mortal pleasures (food, sex, etc.) unless they are Sated. Vampyres are Sated for 1 hour per point of blood, plus 1 hour per point of Veneration (i.e., +1 hour for Full-Blooded, +2 for Elder, +3 for Ancient, and +4 for Old Ones).

Verne wasn't sure about what the levels of vampire 'veneration' meant, if anything, and hadn't had time to test out the limits of how long after blood he could taste food normally... and, of course, he'd never had sex as a vampire. But he'd tasted Maxie's Caribbean veggie curry just fine maybe two and a half hours after he'd sucked however many 'points' (pints?) out of the familiar. That either meant that points were pretty small, that he was a bit 'venerable', or that the rules were inaccurate. It also confirmed that he'd be able to reliably have flashes of basic humanity, so long as he was able to get a steady supply of blood and not suffer from Ravening... which, flipping over to that section, seemed like a very bad thing. Too much blood hunger for too long could, apparently, result in 'Permanent Vampiric Insanity'.

That was all well and good. It told Verne a lot about what to expect and pointed out some pitfalls to avoid and some loopholes to exploit. With regular access to blood, however he might get that, Verne might enjoy a fairly normal un-life. However, there were some more problematic bits, including the section he really wished he'd known about yesterday:

~Turning: A vampyre may create another vampyre with a Great Bite. A successful conversion from human to vampyre happens within 24 + 4d6 hours when the subject passes a –6 Vitality check. This means that subjects with an average Vitality have a ¾ chance to fail. A failed conversion permanently kills the human subject, and the character cannot be resurrected. However, the subject gains a +2 to the roll per point of Veneration of the master vampyre.

Reading that made Verne's blood run cold. Well... ooze cold. His blood didn't exactly run these days. The problem, obviously, was that Verne had naively assumed that vampire bites just worked. Now he was reading that, unless he was venerable (probably not, as he'd only been a vampire for two days) or Lisa had a high vitality (probably not, as she was a NVC patient recovering from a minor stroke), the bite he'd given her was almost certainly deadly. In trying to save his girlfriend, he'd probably killed her. What should he do? If he told her, she'd (rightly) freak the fuck out, and at this point there wasn't much that could be done about it. But, on the other hand, he owed it to Lisa to let her know. She deserved to know. He paced his room – well, Ellen's room, where he'd spent the rest of the night. He held his regular phone in his hands, fingers trembling as he pondered what to tell Lisa.

V: <Lisa, I just got my hands on an 'official' rule book for how vampires work. And it's bad. Really really bad.

L: <??,   she responded a minute later.
L: <What do u mean?
L: <Define really really bad

V: <Promise u won't freak out

L: <Jesus
L: <Fuck
L: <I'm already freaking out rn
L: <What is it? Tell me, Verne.

V: <You've had symptoms of the vampire venom?

L: <Yeah. Bad-ish. Organ pains. Spasms. Pretty much exactly what you said would happen. I almost passed out, and then they passed. Why?
L: <Vernon?
L: <Tell me.

Verne took a deep breath and told her.
V: <So the rule book I got says there's a chance the venom will kill you.
V: <Like kill-kill you. Not vampire kill you.
V: <I thought it was 100%, but maybe it isn't.

L: <FUCK
L: <Verne wtf?
L: <I gotta go

Then Lisa blipped offline. Verne wondered if they were officially broken up now, or whether things would be okay if she survived. Regardless, he really hoped she did. Still, he supposed, accidental murder by vampire poison was probably a better way to go than turning into a vegetable over the course of a year. Verne realized he was rationalizing – he'd done something incredibly reckless and stupid... exactly the sort of thing that Maxie had warned him against... and now Lisa might be for-real dying.

V: <If anybody can make it thru this thing, it's you. I love you. I believe in you,   he messaged.
V: <But I had to let u know

'The user LisaBerry is offline. Your message will appear when they log in,' the app said. Verne sighed and collapsed onto Ellen's bed, sobbing, little purple tears dribbling down his cheeks.

+++++

Lisa didn't half-ass things, and neither did Verne. As far as he was concerned, his life was collapsing around him, and he wasn't one to take half-measures. With everything happening in his life, Verne just couldn't deal with work. He called into Imaging East, where he'd been out sick for the past three days, intending to quit. Then he uncharacteristically half-assed things at the last minute and took an indefinite leave of absence, citing ongoing medical concerns. He got Ram on the phone, who was understandably concerned about Verne's departure, as well as his voice suddenly going up an octave in pitch.

"Are you Verne's girlfriend? Or mom?" He asked.

Verne sighed. "I'm not my fucking girlfriend or mom, Ram. It's part of my medical problem. It's fucking major, and I don't know how long it'll be before I'm ready to work again."

"Okay. I'll take you off next week's shift then. Will you hold on a minute?"

"Yeah."

Ram being Ram, didn't just fetch the schedule. He went and got Dr. Parvolog to tell her about Vern, and the doctor jumped onto the line to try to dissuade him.

"Verne... you're one of my most intuitive and technically savvy techs and I'd hate to lose you. You know we're a very accommodating workplace, right? We welcome employees of every sexual orientation and gender identity."

"What?"

"Listen," she said. "Um... are you still going by Verne?"

"Vera."

The doctor hesitated. "First and last name?"

"Um... yeah. Vera Vera."

"Hmm. Cheeky. Why not? Listen, Vera, I'm not going to beat around the bush. It's obvious you're transitioning, and maybe you have some life issues cropping up from that, but we don't have to be one of them. Will you come in and at least talk to me before you decide to quit?"

Verne sighed and half-assed his half-assing. The people in his life just weren't going to let him burn bridges like that. "I'll call ahead when I'm coming in."

In the background, he could hear Ram give Dr. Parvolog a high-five. Did they really like him that much there?

Verne decided to continue his emotional roller-coaster by stopping by his parents' place. It was only Wednesday, but he was just about resigned to the fact that you couldn't undo vampire transformations – it was a one-way street to undeadsville. That being the case, he might as well clear the air between himself and his father. He texted his mother to make sure Vic was back from work – Verne's father almost never checked his own phone and Verne didn't think he'd ever got a text from his old man, aside from a misspelled 'HAPPY BIRHTDAY!' the one time. He slung his backpack and headed out the door just as Maxie came in from her garden, clapping dirty hands against her tie-dyed dungarees.

"You headed out?"

"To my parents'," Verne said.

Maxie nodded. "Don't be too late. Gloria's coming back into town tonight and she's an early sleeper most nights. I'd love for you two to meet."

Verne had planned on returning to his and Hector's apartment, depending on how things went with his father. He'd already stayed at Maxie's for two nights and had her drive him to Knoxville. She'd extended a lot of hospitality already. "You don't mind? Me staying another night, I mean?"

Maxie laughed and wrapped him up in a hug. "Vera, honey, you can stay for as long as you like. You're at a hard spot in your life, and if the bastards pull you down, you might never surface again. But I have a pet peeve that I'll ask you to respect and it's this: I don't want to hear you hem and haw about how much hospitality I'm giving you. It's mine to give and take, and it'll be crystal clear when I'm getting salty about it. Are we good?"

"We good," Verne said, wriggling out of her grasp. "I'll give you a glowing review on Air BnB."

A minute later, he was out the door. Things were returning to normal-ish, at least in some regards. Hector was at work and indicated that he was stopping by the apartment afterwards to see if things had cleared up. As far as Verne knew, they were both still 'persons of interest' over the incident in the apartment the other day, but Verne wasn't keen on meeting with the cops, as he'd have a lot to explain. Hector would, too, but his was more of a prosaic 'being a nonviolent-drug-dealer' issue, whereas Verne was a damn vampire. Verne applied some SPF 100 and took the S3 bus down to his parents place.

With the SPF 100 and extra dark sunglasses, Verne was pretty much fine, even in the clear light of mid-afternoon. So long as he stayed out of direct sun. He watched the pale skin of his hand sloooowly turn pink-purple in an errant beam, but it barely hurt. He sat on the bus, posting to his various online accounts and checking his chat with Lisa every ten minutes. She still hadn't come back online. Maybe she was ignoring him, and maybe she was dead... maybe she was dead for good. He didn't want to think about that. When he looked up from his phone, a dozen interested gazes pretended to be interested in other things.

He'd decided on pretty gender-neutral clothes for his meeting with his father. Or he'd at least attempted them. None of Ellen's jeans were less than form-fitting, and the smoke-gray button-up blouse was a lot more flattering than he'd initially expected. Sure, there was nothing hot or risqué about it, but the ensemble was distinctly feminine. Anything that didn't deliberately hide his very-feminine body came across as feminine.

"I think I've got some flannel in here somewhere," Maxie had said.

"No, my old man will just have to deal," Verne had replied. Honestly, he kind of wanted to see how his old man would react.

He'd thought the outfit was pretty modest. Either the eleven guys on the bus (and the one woman) were total horndogs, or the outfit was a lot more eye-catching than he'd initially estimated. He tugged at the sleeve, noticing how sleek the fabric was and how perfectly feminine his hands were, like his body was a masterpiece porcelain sculptures that he could pose at will. But, of course, his hands weren't actually delicate. His body was a killing machine. He could overpower anybody on the bus... he could smell their blood.

Verne took a deep breath. The blood cravings were starting again – he'd only taken a bit from Lisa, barely enough to satisfy, and that had been over a day ago. Two points every two days... that's what Ghastly Spires had stated, and it was hard to believe they hadn't cheekily meant to swap 'point' for 'pint'. He'd worry about that next. The first thing to deal with was his father.

OvidLemma

Thanks for reading, and make sure you follow me here to catch my latest releases! Chapters for Transfusion will be posted daily through the end of the novel. If you liked this story, don't forget to check out my many other stories Scribble Hub, Patreon, or Amazon (free with Kindle Unlimited)!

https://www.patreon.com/OvidLemma
https://www.amazon.com/s?i=digital-text&rh=p_27%3AOvid+Lemma