"Brother, my chest suddenly pains!" A young girl of about eight years muttered while seemingly looking dizzy.
This made Zeal to quickly jolt to his feet as he rushed to grab his young sister, Zoe, before she could collapse on the ground.
After all, she had always had a heart disease and he couldn't just ignore the complain no matter how small it might sound.
"Zoe, sit here for a moment." He muttered while supporting his sister to sit on the couch. "I'll go grab some cash I saved for your medication and rush you to the hospital." He added while charging to his room.
However, five minutes later.
"Stacy!" Zeal Imoh, a sixteen years old high school black boy screamed from his room while dashing out and headed to the room next to his.
With a single kick, the door was flung open as Zeal dashed in with anger burning in his chest. His heart was racing faster and the blood was boiling in his body as he looked at a young girl of about seventeen years, sitting in front of a giant mirror while applying makeup on her face.
She seemingly didn't care what was happening around even after hearing Zeal's scream, acting like a princess with no crown on her head.
Of course this just irritated Zeal even more as a murderous intent continue building within him. His aura shifting, becoming cold and chilly as he looked at Stacy.
His eyes became dead as he felt like charging towards her and rip her to pieces, and for a moment, while thinking of this, something with him shifted.
Zeal started hearing some whispers echoing in his head. They were overlapping and sounded more like they were chanting, casting a spell and more like cursing his existence.
This made Zeal to feel like he wasn't doing something right as the whispers were more like taunting him. It made him feel like he had neglected his duty of existence, like an employee feeling guilty after receiving a payment for a project they didn't worked for. And with that, his eyes suddenly became something else.
The shadows rippled across his face as his irises bled into black, swallowing every hint of light. They became dark black in colour with no single pixel of white in them. They seemed dead, or more like commanding death itself with his eyes, the power growing as the whispers overlapped even more louder and fierce.
It was like stirring deep into the hallow eyes of the Grim Reaper, and when Stacy saw this from the reflection of her mirror, she quickly turned around and look at Zeal while taking in a deep heavy gulp.
Unfortunately, this effect only lasted for a second as Zeal returned to his normal state while taking some long strides heading next to Stacy, completely ignore the whispers.
"Those were Zoe's medication fee! How could you take them!?" He screamed with tears lingering in his eyes.
'Did his eyes just...?' Stacy thought while looking at Zeal, only to see his eyes had return to normal. 'No, the lights must have play tricks on me.' She thought while looking around her room.
Stacy's room was that of a Disney princess. Everything within the room was pink and spackling in nature, starting from the walls to the bed and even the toothpaste and toothbrush. Even the light to her room was pink, a typical dream house for a girl princess.
There wasn't anything cheep in the room, thanks to her a year younger cousin's hardwork, Zeal Imoh.
"How dare you walk into my room like that?" Stacy spoke while walking closer to Zeal then–
Smack!
Kissing Zeal with a thunderous slap across his face.
"I warned you before!" Stacy shouted with another slap across Zeal's face. "My room isn't for a begger like you and your stupid sister." She muttered while stepping back and sat ontop of her mirror desk. "Bedsides, one of my friends has a birthday party coming soon and I have to give him something expensive. You won't mind that I took the money, right?" She asked with her hands crossed across her chest.
The words pierced through Zeal's heart like a thousand sharp blades. He could perfectly remember how he hsd worked so hard to save that money just in case Zoe's condition worsen, and now this? He just couldn't take it anymore.
This made him to feel like he had betrayed his mother, break the last promise he made to her before she died.
Her death wasn't natural though. She was killed... By some strange beings with red glowing eyes and fangs. And when Zeal tried to look into this, he found the closest matching details of those creatures were vampires.
But that's the thing, Vampires are a myth, they don't exist. They are just some mythical stories told to children to scare and keep them in line, so how could they possibly come from the stories and kill his mother of everyone in the existence, that was ultimately impossible that made Zeal feel like maybe he dreamed or hallucinated about that part.
After all, he was just ten years old kid at the moment and his young sister, Zoe, was just two years old.
But one thing that was certainly clear in his mind to the date was the last promise he made to his mother before she was dragged away by those creatures, to protect his young sister at any cost, and that's what exactly Zeal has been doing for the past six years.
They were taken in by the older sister to his late mother, but it ain't like thier lives has been a life in the paradise ever since they came living here.
They were bullied, treated like slaves ever since they came here. This is in fact one of the reasons why Zoe developed some heart problems, forcing Zeal to work multiple after school part-time jobs just to afford his sister's expensive medication fee.
His aunty couldn't just care, and it wasn't like all the money he earned went into Zoe's medication. Most of them were snatched by Stacy who cared for nothing other than her looks and praises.
This was just too much and Zeal couldn't take it anymore. He felt like something within him was cracking, struggling to break out as the whispers began again.
But this time, they weren't just taunting, they were commanding, taking control over Zeal while replacing his aura with a death essence.
Kill!
Kill!
Kill!
Kill!
They echoed through Zeal's head.
His eyes shifted again to a darker state like a midnight starless night, and without knowing it, Zeal had suddenly lost his consciousness, but his body was there, still standing, facing the ground with his fists tightly clenched.
"Kill." A soft whisper suddenly came from his parted black lips. "Kill... kill... kill." He spoke, synchronizing with the voices in his head.
"Get out of my room, I have some makeups to work on!" Stacy commanded while jumping down her mirror desk and walked towards Zeal to push him out.
But when Zeal raised his head and a looked deep into her eyes, she suddenly stumbled back and crashed on her arse, hitting her head against the desk as she started to bleed out.
As if cheering for this, Zeal unconscious lips curved to a creepy smile as he took a step towards Stacy. But before he could take another step–
"Brother help! It hurts so much!" Zoe's desperate cry snapped Zeal back to the world of the living.