My eyelids fluttered as I heard screaming outside the room. It was a rather dark one with only a few magical lamps spending a bit of light. I sat upright, incredibly confused where I was, only slowly remembering what happened six days before.

My head swayed slowly as I sat upright and I looked down on myself while trying to fight back the tears. Largely unsuccessful, I noticed how tears mixed with blood on my chest … so much blood. Everywhere on my body, there was blood, from my toes to my chest.

I looked towards my right, knowing there was a mirror there and saw that even my face was bloodied. Even worse, I somehow lost my contact lenses as well some time ago. I could even feel my weakness due to the sun as I looked towards the person on my left.

The Pope of Death laid there, his ribcage ripped open by what could only be described as a bear attack. His organs were littered on the bed and looking at my feet, I could see the next dead man.

In total, there were four dead men in that room and going by the stuff oozing out of me, it must have been the last night I murdered every one of them.

“It´s over.” I said, robbing a bit backwards and leaning my back against the headboard. I hugged my knees in desperation, probably giving the one who would eventually stumble in this room the time of his life. “Maybe they will rape me as well…” I really wished for it. I just wanted to forget again, preferably everything. I didn´t even try to remember. I only wished that I could forget Laura´s death … but I failed.

Sadness overwhelmed me yet again, and I wept even as the sounds of battle reached this door. I wept as they went past me, and I wept as they died down altogether. My plan worked … like always. The church of life came to safe me. But it was too late to save what was precious to me.

I was still a sobbing mess as the door finally opened and light flooded through the room. For a short while, I could see nothing as gasps resounded in front of the door and a man slowly strode into the room. Only as he closed the door behind him again could I see my belly again as I rested my forehead on my arms.

“Lucy … my saint.” I heard the voice of Pope Dustin in front of me, wavering and yet determined.

“T-There is nothing saintly about me.” I muttered, fighting back the tears that were coming once more. For once, I couldn’t mask my emotions at all. What he saw was my unfiltered despair. Slowly, the Pope strode towards the bedside, ignored the corpses in the room and knelt to my side. Carefully, he reached out to me until his hand touched mine.

“You are safe now.” He said in a soothing voice.

“I … will never be. Not from myself, nor from anyone else.” I said and turned my head towards the right, looking into his silver eyes, revealing my red ones to him. I didn´t know what went on in his head, and neither was I in the condition to analyse his behaviour as he shrank away from me a little, but then placed his hand even more firmly upon mine.

“Lucy … you are a vampire?” He asked, still taken aback slightly.

“I was … and I will be forever. I will be forever damned to hurt the ones I like, to drag everyone down with me” I stated, slowly getting better, even though my words may have indicated something else.

“Lucy, your actions define you, not what you are.” He said, in the middle of four dead men.

“Tell that Laura.” I said, already tearing up again.

“I´m sure she knows that already.” Maybe … maybe he was right. Maybe she let herself be suffocated to death by my own hand because she knew it was out of love. Because she knew I wouldn’t hurt her if there was a better alternative. But even thinking about it in this way sickened me.

“I´m ending this. Now.” I said and slowly stood up on the bed. Still naked, I took a step forwards until I noticed that the Pope´s hand was still on mine.

“Lucy, I cannot let you do that.” He said firmly.

“Why? I murdered them … all of them.” I pointed towards each and everyone in anguish. I only wanted to be hated by everyone, and I couldn’t understand why he, the Pope of Life, refused to let go of me, a person who ended so much life.

“You aren’t yourself right now.” He was certainly right with that. I was out of my mind, but I also knew I would only bring pain to those I held dear.

“You are … you are just worried about the reputation of your church and the gods.” I said slowly.

“Lucy, I have worked with enough traumatized humans to know when they aren’t thinking straight. This … I cannot even imagine what you have been through, and I understand that it hurts. You can reveal yourself to the world later, but you must know what you will ruin with it. The orphanage you worked so hard for, where you spent every minute of your free time, will be forced to shut down. The kids there will land on the street again. Lucy, the world needs a saint.”

“I´m not a saint. I murdered hundreds and hundreds of people.” I stated, which didn´t seem to bother him much.

“The gods selected you as their saint.” He stated in blind faith.

“… because I was the most useful one.” I said, nearly crying again.

“They made the right decision. You are helping so many people. Lucy, we need you. The children need you.” He said and pulled me down onto the bed again.

Maybe he was right. Stopping now would mean ruining the lives of so many. But going on? Who could say how many of my friends I needed to murder?

“The future is not set in stone.” I muttered and closed my eyes. Somewhat, I calmed down, enough for the Pope to let go of me.

“Precisely. Are you feeling better?” He asked, worry still written all over his face.

“A bit.” I said and exhaled loudly.

“Shall we get out of here?” He asked and stood up after his saint finally calmed down.

“That´s a good idea.” I said, but looked down on me. Like this and with my red eyes, I could hardly go out.

“Do you know where a blanket is?” He asked.

“In the upper part of that shelve.” I pointed towards the left, even though I couldn´t remember actually opening that compartment.

I sat down on the edge of the bed, waiting for him to come back. Shortly afterwards, I stood up and he wrapped the blanket around my shoulders. At least it went to my knees this way, denying any curious gazes to peek at me indecently.

“Are you ready?” I nodded, then closed my eyes and felt how he reached down underneath my knees. I made sure that the blanket stayed in place while he carried me out into the masses of holy warriors they could muster. I´m sure he enjoyed that.

Saving his saint in front of so many … would surely benefit the church of life. But it would also benefit me. He was bound to me after I revealed my race to him and going by his reaction inside the room, life wasn’t the only thing he knew about. But that wasn’t what was on my mind at this point.

It was still Laura.