THE DAY I SLAYED MY VAMPIRE LOVER
Their eyes, deprived of the controlled, chemical glow, dilated into abyssal pits of pure, insatiable famine.
They swarmed out from the vents, the rafters, and the shattered mirrors”a legion of starving, feral things.
Cattleya stood atop the frozen, silent heart of the machine, her body a statue of silver filaments and frost. She watched as the first wave of vampires descended upon the cathedral floor, their movements no longer graceful, but twitching, insectile, and frantic. They didn't see her as a person. They saw her as the only remaining vessel of the "blood"—the source of the power that had sustained them for centuries.