But then, the world went sideways.
That creepy bastard on the asphalt- the one Cassian thought was down for the count- snapped its hands up. Ice-cold fingers clamped around his ankle like iron cuffs.
Cassian froze, his breath hitching. He looked down through the dark. Fangs. Massive, needle-sharp teeth caught the faint glare of the streetlights, inches from tearing into his flesh.
Panic hit his chest like a direct jolt of electricity. His brain short-circuited, but his body didn’t wait. Survival instinct took over. He swung his free leg around with a violent twist, driving his heavy boot squarely into the vampire-like creature’s jaw.
Crack.
The thing let out a wet, sickening groan, its head snapping back against the gravel. Cassian didn’t waste half a second. Keeping his feet, he stomped onto its face to pin it to the dirt; he wrapped his fingers around the key jammed deep into his neck. He gritted his teeth, braced himself, and yanked it out with a brutal, tearing force.
"What the hell...?" Cassian choked out, his chest heaving as he stumbled backward.
He stared, his stomach twisting in pure disbelief. When he had stabbed the creature earlier, normal, dark human blood had spilled onto the road. But now? The fluid oozing from the fresh puncture wound was wrong. It was a thick, glowing, vibrant green. It looked mechanical, alien, completely detached from anything living.
His mind spun, losing its grip on logic. But the sudden roar of panic in his head reminded him there was no time to think. Alissa was still out there. His parents were in danger. He had to move, or they were all dead.
Cassian scrambled onto his bike, slammed his foot onto the kickstarter, and tore down the dark street. He didn’t look back at the bleeding monstrosity twitching in the dirt.
The freezing night wind whipped past, stinging his face. A warm, heavy droplet slid down his forehead, burning into his left eye before tracing a slow path down his cheek. He wiped it with the back of his hand. Crimson. His own blood. He was losing too much of it, and the metallic smell of iron was making him nauseous. His vision began to blur into a shaky haze, and a heavy, suffocating weight pulled at his eyelids. He couldn’t faint now. Not here.
Grip tightening on the rubber handlebars until his knuckles went white, he kicked the bike into top gear. The engine screamed under the strain, vibrating violently between his thighs until he finally skidded to a chaotic halt right outside Alissa’s house.
"ALISSA! CAN YOU HEAR ME?!" Cassian roared.
His throat felt like sandpaper, his voice cracking from the absolute strain as the bike’s engine idled with a low metallic click-click-click. "IT’S ME, CASSIAN... I’m here! Everything is fine!"
Silence. The suburban street remained dead. Not a single porch light flickered.
"ALISSA!" He took a ragged, desperate breath, trying to force the air back into his collapsing lungs. "Listen to me... I’m... Cass- Cass-"
The words died. His legs turned to water. Cassian slammed straight onto the asphalt, his knees taking the full brunt of the impact. The rough pavement ripped right through his denim jeans, peeling back the skin in a raw burn, but the throbbing in his head drowned out the pain.
"Cas... Cassian? Is that..."
A faint trembling whisper drifted down from the second-story window. It was barely a breath, but in the dead quiet of the night, Cassian caught it. He forced his heavy, leaden head up. Small, pale fingers were shaking violently as they gripped the peeling paint of the outer window ledge.
"Alissa..." he breathed, the edges of his vision turning into a swarm of black static. The head injury was finally winning.
Alissa peered over the ledge and her breath caught. Cassian looked like a corpse. His face was entirely painted in dark, wet crimson, and the white shirt he’d wrapped around his head earlier was completely soaked through, clinging to his skin like a bloody rag.
"CASSIAN!"
The scream tore from her chest, raw and ugly. She bolted toward the center of the room, but her legs felt like lead weights. A brutal, raging fever was baking her body from the inside out, making her skin burn, yet her heart felt like it was submerged in freezing water. Shivering uncontrollably, she stumbled blindly toward the wardrobe, her hip slamming into the corner of her desk, knocking a stack of books onto the floor with a loud crash.
"SOMEONE HELP!" she sobbed, her voice breaking as she yanked the wardrobe doors open.
Her hands shook so violently she couldn’t get a proper grip on anything. She frantically dumped the clothes, plastic hangers, and shoe boxes onto the floor, desperate for the emergency kit. Her knees buckled, sending her sliding into the mess. Nothing.
Wiping the hot tears from her eyes with her sleeve, she dragged herself up and lunged toward the bookshelf. "CASSIAN, I’M COMING! Just wait for me! Please!"
The bedroom looked like a hurricane had ripped through it. Finally, her scraped fingers hit the smooth plastic of the medical box. Inside was a fresh bottle of saline and an IV needle. Living alone with her stubborn, aging grandmother had forced Alissa to learn basic medical care at home; the old woman would rather die than go to the hospital. Alissa had learned early that she had to be her own backup.
She grabbed a discarded canvas tote bag from the floor, shoved the supplies inside without looking, and flew downstairs. She threw the heavy front door open and sprinted across the cold pavement barefoot, the bag clutched tightly in her fist, the rocks biting into her soles.
Cassian was already tipping sideways, his balance completely gone as the darkness dragged him down.
Alissa dropped to her knees right into the dirt in front of him, catching his dropping shoulders with both hands, bracing his dead weight against her own chest.
"Your hands... they’re burning," Cassian muttered, his chin resting against his chest. His voice was a tiny, fading rasp. "Alissa, take your medicine... why are you always... so careless..."
Alissa didn’t answer. She just pulled him into a tight, desperate hug, sinking completely onto the hard road and letting him lean his full weight against her.
"Just lean on me," she whispered, her chest heaving against his. "Everything is fine. You told me that, right? You have to be fine first."
With a trembling, sweating palm, she cradled the back of his sticky head, gently guiding him down until he was resting across her lap.
She reached into the tote bag, tearing it open to pull out handfuls of cotton, a bottle of clear disinfectant, and a rolled-up crepe bandage. Her ached with every sob, but she forced herself to keep talking. She knew if his eyes closed for too long, they might never open again.
"Cassian, listen to me. You’re tall, you’re handsome, you’re annoying, you’re smart," she blurted out, her fingers working frantically to unwind the stiff, blood-hardened shirt from his head. She sniffed hard, the sharp smell of antiseptic stinging her nose. "I’m only marrying you for your money, okay? You can’t die and ruin my financial future. Do you hear me, idiot?"
Cassian looked up, his pupils dilated, staring directly into her tear-filled eyes. A weak, agonizing gasp escaped his lips, but his bloody mouth twitched into a faint, stupid smile. "You... love... me. I knew it."
Alissa pressed a large wad of cotton against his forehead, wiping away the slick coating of red to find the tear in his skin. She ignored the minor scratches on his cheeks, focusing entirely on the deep gash near his hairline that was pulsing with fresh blood. Pouring the antiseptic onto a clean handkerchief, she pressed it down hard against the wound. Cassian flinched, a low groan escaping his throat. She held it tight, forcing the bleeding to stop before she began wrapping the bandage around his skull, pulling it snug.
"Yes, you’ll be my whole life," she sobbed, her tears splashing directly onto his cheek. "So why wouldn’t I love you? Come on, react! Tell me what you think of me?"
"I... love..."
Cassian didn’t finish the sentence. His eyes rolled back, his jaw went slack, and his entire body went completely limp across her thighs.
"Cass? Cass, wake up!" Alissa slapped his cheeks with her shaky hands, the cold terror hitting her stomach like lead. "What? Tell me! Cassian, please say something! Look at me!"
Maybe the confession had just been a desperate lie to keep his brain active, but watching him go completely cold shattered something inside her.
She wrapped her arms around his torso, burying her face into the crook of his neck, and screamed into the empty street. "HELP US! PLEASE! SOMEONE!"
Through the deep gloom of the unlit road, two shadows materialized, moving quickly toward them. It was too dark to see their faces, just the dark outlines of their clothes against the fog. Alissa didn’t care who they were.
"HELP! Over here!" She screamed, waving a frantic, bloody arm while keeping Cassian pinned on her lap.
The two figures broke into a sudden run- a man and a woman.
"I’ll take him inside. Let go of him," the man said as he slid to a stop. His voice sounded flat, completely empty, devoid of any natural urgency or human panic.
Alissa, blinded by the desperation and the fog in her own head, let go. She watched the man heft Cassian’s limp body easily over his shoulder like a sack of grain.
Before she could follow them up the porch steps, the woman grabbed Alissa tightly by the wrist. Its grip was freezing. "Here. Drink this. It’s for the fever." She pressed a small, cold glass vial filled with a strange, thick, shimmering liquid right into Alissa’s palm.
Alissa stared down at the glass. A sudden, icy dread hit her gut. The silence of the couple, the weightless way the man carried Cassian, and this glass vial something from before- something was completely wrong.
Slamming the vial down onto the asphalt, which didn’t break, but Alissa bolted toward the man carrying Cassian-