It was dark out when I woke up. I felt good, it wasn't often Samantha let me sleep in. According to the clock next to my bed, it was just past eight, Saturday night.

I'd been out for over fourteen hours, which was a little excessive. I figured Sam was making it up to me after getting me up so early yesterday.

I slipped out of bed and walked naked to the door, and quietly opened it and peaked out.

The TV was still on, but it was in screen-saver mode. Sam was sitting on the sofa with her head tilted back, exposing her throat. I emerged from my room and moved around the sofa to approach her.

She must have got undressed after I went to bed, she was naked now too. Her athletic body wasn't curvy like mine. Her hips, butt, boobs, were all on the small side. I still thought she was beautiful, but no-one would ever suggest she should work at Cheryl's club.

Her skin was pale and smooth and almost perfect, there were only a couple blemishes.

She had two oval-shaped scars on her belly a couple inches to the left of her navel, and I knew there were three diagonal scars on her back over her right shoulder blade, sort of like from an animal's claws. We didn't usually scar from injuries, everything was supposed to heal up perfectly. I didn't know how she managed to get the scars, she wouldn't tell me. That was another long story waiting for another day.

After looking at her for a minute or so I suppressed a shudder. It was yet another thing I still wasn't used to, even after three years. A sleeping vampire looked exactly like a dead human. We only breath so we can talk, and when we're asleep we just stop.

I found it completely unsettling and just wrong. Like deeply disturbingly wrong. A sleeping human at least has that regular rise and fall of their chest. Sometimes they even move a little, or make the odd sound. Looking down at Sam as she sat there motionless on the sofa, there was nothing.

The only way to know she wasn't actually dead was to wake her up. Or take her temperature, vamps weren't entirely cold. We ran a lot cooler than a living human, but we were warmer than a dead one. And of course we didn't rot, unlike dead humans.

I shuddered and pushed that line of thought away as I realized it was getting morbid.

Staring at Samantha was just as uncomfortable though. It was ironic because I knew it was exactly the same with me. Once I was asleep I looked just as dead as any other vamp. I figured that didn't bother me as much since I never had to see myself sleeping.

After another few seconds I picked up the remote control, it was on the sofa next to her leg. I tapped a button and the TV switched from screen-saver to the streaming site. I checked the recently-watched list then smiled. It looked like she made it to the end of the first season of Buffy while I slept.

As I set the remote down on the coffee table Sam suddenly came to life. Her eyes opened as she raised her head up, and I let out a startled yelp as I jumped.

"Holy crap," Sam burst into giggles. "Why are you so jumpy Tara? What were you up to?"

I was blushing again as I sighed "Damnit Sam! I was just checking on you. You nearly started my heart!"

She giggled again as she got up and went into her bedroom. She returned a moment later carrying her phone. She was still grinning as she sat back down and started tapping the screen.

"So what are we doing today?" I finally asked, as I moved to sit on the arm of the sofa.

Samantha's attention was still on her phone as she replied, "I'm just checking my messages and emails to find out. If there's no news or no new orders, then it's the usual."

I sighed, "Right. We worked last night, so training tonight."

"Yep," she replied. Her smile had already faded, now she was frowning at whatever she was reading on the small screen. Finally she set her phone down on the coffee table.

"So what do you feel like tonight? Hands-on training? Combat training? Theory?"

"Really?" I asked, with a healthy dose of skepticism in my tone. "You're letting me pick?"

She shrugged, "I'm not promising we'll do what you want, but I'm asking for your input."

I liked that she was honest about it. I might not get my choice, but at least she was asking for my preference.

"How about theory tonight?" I asked. "Then we don't have to go anywhere, we can just stay here and chill out."

Samantha seemed to be considering it, then announced "Pop quiz! What's the fastest way to kill a vamp?"

I sighed, "Behead them. Assuming you have a sword or axe or something handy."

She nodded and went straight to the next question, "All you've got's a garden hoe, how do you kill me?"

"Uh," I frowned. I couldn't remember what a garden hoe was, or what it looked like so I just guessed. "Use the metal end to rip out your throat?"

"Good," she nodded again. "So we've got beheading, ripping out the throat, what's another way to kill a vamp?"

She wasn't giving me any time to think or recover between questions, it was just one thing after another. I knew this was supposed to be like testing me under pressure, but I wasn't really prepared to be quizzed so soon after waking up.

"Uh..."

"Tick tock tick tock" Sam said.

I wasn't sure what that was meant to achieve, but what it actually did was distract me and put me under even more pressure so I couldn't think of anything at all.

"Bzzt!" she stated, "Time's up. Fire's an option. It hurts like hell and we don't heal from burns as quickly as other damage. If you have enough fire you can burn us to death, cremate us. Or use it like a weapon, like a blowtorch to the throat or something."

"Sorry," I sighed. "I -"

She interrupted, "Sunlight? Fatal or not?"

"Not," I frowned.

"Wooden stake through the heart?" she asked next.

I replied, "Painful and inconvenient but not fatal."

"How about holy water?"

I shook my head, "Another myth."

Sam shot back, "What about blessed battery acid?"

I frowned as my mind raced. Would that work? Where would you even find that? Who blesses battery acid?

"Trick question," she stated after a few seconds. "Battery acid can hurt us, doesn't matter if it's blessed or not. Any kind of strong acid for that matter. Same with strong bases. If it'll burn corrode or eat human flesh it'll do the same to us. But we can heal from it, unless we're like swimming in a vat of the stuff. It's just physical damage."

"Huh," I frowned, then shuddered again. "I don't want to see that, or hear about it, or even think about that."

I kept wondering when she'd bring up silver. That was the big one. Rather than wasting time with fake stuff like holy water and wooden stakes I figured she'd at least mention silver since it was so serious. Unless she was skipping it because it was just too obvious.

Samantha just rolled her eyes in response to my squeamishness and moved on to the next question. "What about electrocution?"

I sighed, "That can stun us but it won't kill us."

"How about a cross or crucifix?" she asked next.

I shook my head, "Completely useless."

"Pepper spray?"

"Uh," I frowned for a moment, "Painful but not debilitating?"

Sam asked, "How about mace?"

"The spray stuff is same as pepper spray I think? It can hurt but won't damage us. The medieval kind causes physical damage but we heal."

"And guns?" she asked.

I sighed again, "Bullets hurt and can slow us down, but we heal."

Samantha nodded, "Very good. The bottom line is, we're tougher than humans and we heal faster and most injuries won't even leave a mark. A good meal will speed healing. But our bodies aren't indestructible, if you do enough damage it'll slow us down or even stop us. Ripping out our throat is fatal because we can't heal from that, we can't feed if we can't swallow blood. You can burn us to ash, dissolve us in acid, throw us in a wood-chipper or something like that, do enough damage to the whole body and we're done. But just a few bullet holes or some broken bones or cuts or whatever, and we'll heal up again pretty quick."

By this point I was feeling really uncomfortable, all of these things sounded terrible and unpleasant. And most of them were scary. The fact that we still felt pain meant we could still be hurt, even if we healed. Getting shot might not kill us, but it would still hurt just as much.

I thought back to last night when she mouthed off at the cops. They carried guns, clubs, pepper spray, maybe they even had tasers. Plus they were big strong guys.

"Tara?" Sam asked after a few moments of silence. "What's on your mind?"

I shrugged, "Just thinking about those two cops last night. I'm still nervous around the police, but you're fearless..."

She rolled her eyes, "There's nothing they can do to hurt you. They might be bigger, but you're stronger. None of their weapons can harm you."

"But they *can* hurt us," I corrected her. "They can shoot us, pepper spray us, break bones with their steel batons. All that still hurts, even if we do heal afterwards."

Before she could respond to that I added, "What if they get handcuffs on us? Then we can't fight."

"Ok first off they're not strong enough to cuff you unless you let them," she stated. "And second off, if you ever do get handcuffs on you, they're easy to get out of. Just break one of your thumbs, slide your hand out, then snap the loose cuff on the other wrist so it's not dangling around. That leaves you one good hand to fight with while the other one's healing."

I suppressed another shudder, "You'd break your own thumb?"

Samantha sighed, "Sure, it's a quick and easy way to get out of handcuffs. And it freaks the humans out. Like I said, human cops can't do anything to us. And after you've been shot a few times and broken a few bones, all that stuff kind of looses its mystique. You get over it. Bullets are scary for humans, for us it's like a bee sting."

I turned to look at her and asked nervously, "Have you ever been shot?"

"Yep," she shrugged. "A bunch. And I've broken bones in my arms and hands, and a couple in my feet and legs. That's sucky because it hurts to walk or run. But pain can't kill us, any more than bullets. You get used to it, get over it."

She added, "That's why a lot of us 'peace keepers' carry a flask. Taking a swig of blood will accelerate the healing process, boost our strength, and just generally make us feel better right? Sometimes you just need to find a quiet spot to hide so you can slam down a few mouthfuls of blood, then you're ready to dive back into the fray."

By that point I was feeling completely freaked out again. I couldn't imagine being in that sort of situation. Shot, broken, hurting, whatever, and just drink some blood then go right back into a fight and do it all over again.

Samantha obviously saw how upset I was getting at all this stuff. She put an arm around my shoulders and suggested, "I think that's enough morbid theory for now. Let's take a break, then we'll do something else later."

I didn't resist or complain. I leaned up against her side and sighed. And for the thousandth time I worried I wasn't cut out for any of this. I wasn't brave like her, I wasn't tough like her. I didn't like to think of myself as a coward, but the idea of getting in an actual fight scared me.

Samantha was quiet for now, she didn't suggest any other training ideas just yet. And I wasn't eager to do anything else either, I was comfortable just relaxing and cuddling against her.

After a couple minutes I finally asked, "Sam? How did you get so tough? I mean, you're fearless. Nothing scares you. Cops, Cynthia, you just stare everything down. You talk about getting shot or hurt like it was nothing. All the ways you know of killing vamps and stuff, none of that seems to bother you..."

She took a deep breath, then let out a deep sigh. Her voice was soft as she explained. "Isabelle trained me hard. She toughened me up. And not a day goes by Tara that I don't worry I'm screwing up by going easy on you? But I can't hurt you. And I won't turn you over to someone else so they can train you, because I couldn't let them do that to you either."

Sam sighed again, "I can't stand to see you get hurt, and I worry that makes me a bad teacher."

I didn't know what to say after hearing that. There was a little flutter in my stomach though, and for now I forgot about the difficult questions and the unpleasant stuff, like why training had to be painful and how Isabelle toughened her up.

Instead I just cuddled a little closer against Samantha and enjoyed this quiet break together.

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