Monday, October 27th, 2025, 3:13 am. RCMP Officer Karl Brooks pulled over to the side of the road. He was dressed in his uniform consistent of a navy blue shirt and pants, a bullet proof vest with the word "POLICE" in all white on the front and a large wide-top hat with a plastic blue rim. He adjusted his vest as he stepped out of the car, his arms at his sides with a scowl on his face.
He had just clocked in for work, and he was already being tasked with securing a potential homicide scene. It was a rarity in such a small town, especially when everyone knew who everyone was. With a population of just over 5,000, it was hard for that not to be the case.
And yet, a murder had occurred. Some sick bastard had taken the life of another, and in his town no less... it was hard to believe, yet he knew that no one would make a joke like that.
The person who reported it had been a homeless person, and when police arrived he was taken into custody for questioning; not because he was a suspect but to see if he had seen or known anything else. Thankfully, the man cooperated, but no new reports had come back from that.
"There ya are, Karl. Was wondering when you'd get here," a voice called over as Karl turned his attention to the direction where the voice came from. The voice belonged to another officer on the force. Harold Thompson. A Constable, and one who had been with the station for a little over ten years. Karl had been in for longer, about a year or so more, but he had never chased a premotion.
Yet, Karl still found himself being a Corporal; a rank higher than Constable.
Harold Thompson was a darker skinned man, closer to dark chocolate in colour than brown. He had brown eyes and he sported a thin but respectable mustache. He, much like Karl, wore the RCMP uniform, only the patch on his shoulder representative of his rank was different. But aside from that, his uniform was the same.
Harold was also more on the leaner side of things. Karl was more muscular, but Harold could run for far longer and he was much more dexterous. Despite being built like a brick house, Karl wasn't that good of a runner despite being in shape. It was due to an injury he got a few years ago, when he had turned 40.
That aside, him and Harold had been friends for the better half of the decade he had been on the force. Harold had been there in some of his roughest times, helping him get through it all. While Harold wasn't a Mormon like Karl was, he still held respect for the man. He was a family friend, much like Trevor was, and in the respects as Trevor, Harold would always be a brother to Karl.
"Yes, I'm here. What's the damage?" Karl asked as Harold's expression soured.
"You aren't going to like this…" Harold said, before gesturing him to follow. Karl grew concerned. He didn't like hearing that. Not at all. The last time he was told that, it involved responding to a late SOS signal from Missus Crawfelds Lifeline device. They were a minute late, and she died on the floor from a broken neck.
It was a horrible thing to witness. But at least she died relatively harm-free.
The same could not be said for what was seeing right now.
It was a little boy, maybe ten years old. He was curled up on a sidewalk with blood pooling around his neck. The source of the blood was two puncture holes about the same size as a needle, and there had been signs of a struggle what with his sleeves being ripped and a scrape on the back of his hand.
The boy was dead, and he had a book bag on his back, meaning that he was either leaving a friends house or he had been walking to where the bus was supposed to have picked him up for school. Karl didn't recognize the boy, but that nevertheless did not change his disgust.
"This is horrible," Karl spat, his jaw clenched. This was the third attack like this in the last few days. First it was Jolyne, who by all accounts should not have lived, then it was James Bennett, a thirty year old mill worker and ex-convict, and now this kid.
The attacks seemed random, without a connection, aside from the two holes in the neck; although in Jolyne's case her throat had been ripped out, so perhaps these were two different people. One was more precise, and the other messier. Less refined but more brutal.
"We have a detective on his way, but… Someone else dropped by a few minutes ago asking to see the body," Harold said as Karl raised an eyebrow.
"And where are they?"
"They left just as you were pulling in. But, their name was Viktor Van Helsing. We weren't going to let him through, but he pulled authority on us and hit us with an Inspector Rank Badge. We verified him pretty quick, he took one look at the body, muttered something about "filthy bloodsuckers" then left claiming that he knew what needed to know," Harold explained before shrugging. "Guy was a weirdo. He also carried some really freaky buzzsaw on a stick. Almost went to detain him for that alone but he had all the right permits for it."
"Van Helsing was here?" Karl thought, confused. Why on Earth would such a young man be coming to crime scenes and investigating them? And how on Earth was he able to get an Inspector Rank Badge? That was the sixth highest rank in the RCMP, and those who earned it were usually in their 30s to 40s.
Whatever it was that had been going on with Viktor quite frankly did not matter to Karl. What mattered to him was finding out who the bastard was that did this to such a young child, and how they could ensure that it never happened again.
"When did you say that the detective was supposed to get here?" Karl asked as Harold looked at his watch.
"He should be here in less than five minutes."
"Do I need to be here?" Karl asked as Harold sighed.
"No, but it would be nice to have you around. Makes things a little easier."
"Fine."
With today already off to a bad start, it could only get better from here. He just hoped that they were able to catch the killer with relative ease. There hadn't been an event like this in Creston since Dale Merle Nelson in the 70s, and they didn't need another one.
***
Jolyne did not sleep well last night. She had been anxious after the church service, and also extremely conflicted. On the one hand, despite her many problems with religion, she didn't mind being there. On the other hand, she felt that overwhelming sense of animosity from the others in the room. She both felt welcomed and ushered to leave.
Although there was one thing that had left her confused. Of all the times that she decided to show up to Church, Julliette wasn't there. Maybe she was sick and missed out on going to the service. Her parents were there, but Julliette herself was not.
She just hoped nothing bad had happened to Julliette.
As Jolyne sat up in bed, she looked around her bedroom and sighed. Jolyne's bedroom was abnormal compared to the usual teenage girls bedroom. Of course, she had her mirror desk that her mother got her when she was ten, and she had a built-in closet to the right of her bed. But then there was a bookshelf.
On the bookshelf there half-a-dozen fictional books, ranging from The Dresden Files, The Stormlight Archives, Mistborn, The Lord of The Rings, to The Chronicles of Nick. And that was just American novels.
There were half a dozen Deadpool comics, some Spiderman comics, and even Transformers comics. Mixed in with that was Parts One through Six of the English translation of Jojo's Bizarre Adventure, and the first three volumes of My Hero Academia.
Above her bed was another flat shelf with all 16 volumes of the Overlord Light Novel—her favourite series since she was ten years old, as it had been the first anime she ever watched. It was actually thanks to her cousin that she found out it existed. Ainz had been her spirit animal, and if anything bad happened to him she would probably implode.
But aside from that, her room had been painted blue, and she had a few adult posters lining her walls, all of which had been of attractive women in scantily clad clothing.
Her parents had been rather dissapointed in her and her father nearly threw a fit when he had seen them, but in her defense, she was legally an adult so that meant she could buy whatever she wanted with whatever money she had, just so long as it wasn't booze, weed, or cigarettes.
Although, to be fair, she hadn't had a job since she was sixteen working at the local McDonalds. She had been fired for not being "reliable" as they put it. The reality was that she had been sick for too many days in a row and thus she had been fired.
Frankly, it was total bull. But, there wasn't much she could do about it now. It wasn't her fault that they kept scheduling her less and less and never bothered to answer their emails or texts.
Stretching, Jolyne yawned, before slipping out of bed. She grabbed a change of clothes from her closet—a black hoodie, bright pink tank top, a violet above-the-knee pleated skirt, a pair of black fishnet leggings, and of course undergarments.
Taking the clothes, all neatly stacked in a pile from first to be put on to last, Jolyne walked downstairs, passing by her mother drinking a cup of coffee. They silently greeted one another—her mother wasn't much of a talker in the morning when she first woke up, and neither was Jolyne; before making it to where she needed to be.
From the kitchen there was a hallway off to the left of the living room which led to the bathroom, as well as her parents bedroom, but that wasn't important. Inside the bathroom there was the basic amenities; a sink, a mirror, a toilet, and a standing shower. Grabbing a towel from the underneath the sink cupboard, and placing the towel on top of her clothes, Jolyne began to prep for taking said shower.
She grabbed another towel for in front of the shower so she didn't get water all over the tile, and stripped down to nothing as she closed the bathroom door behind her, locking it. She knew she didn't need to, but her father had drilled it into her head that she needed to lock any bathroom she was in if possible. Just in case.
Turning on the shower, she waited till the water was at least slightly warm, then stepped inside. It was simple: Shampoo, conditioner, bodywash, rinse. She made sure to get every nook and cranny, and made sure that every inch of her hair had been scrubbed thoroughly, before finally rinsing herself off, stepping out, drying off, then getting dressed.
Once she got dressed, she brushed her hair and made sure it didn't look like a pigsty. When she was finally done, it was 6:45 am, and she had woken up fifteen minutes ago. The shower had made her feel refreshed and awake, which helped immensely seeing as she wasn't exactly a morning person.
As she walked down the hall, she finally got a vocal greeting from her mother. "Good morning, Jojo. How was your sleep?" Susan asked as Jolyne smirked, tossing her dirty laundry into the hamper next to her parents room, the smirk vanishing as she spoke.
"I didn't sleep well last night," Jolyne replied, leaning up against the counter face first and grabbing a banana, which had been hanging over a fruit bowl alongside a bunch of other bananas. The kitchen itself was a bit of a mess. There were some stray dishes next to the sink, which itself had been full of clean dishes.
Jolyne had meant to put them away for her mother last night, but she had been pretty drained after helping her clean the house. Father had went to bed early so he could be rested for his shift in the morning, so that left all the work to her mother and herself.
Granted, the extra bit of stamina thanks to being a vampire helped immensely. If she had still been human she would have been way more tired.
Overlooking the rest of the kitchen, it had a rather simple set up. A fridge next to to the wall connecting the hallway that led to the bathroom and her parents room. Next to the fridge was a stove and oven combo, and wedged between the two was a countertop that had a microwave plugged in.
Over by the pair of stainless steel sinks there was a large cupboard the housed all of the dishes; plates and bowls on the bottom row, cups on the second, and extras above that. There was a drawer underneath the massive cabinet that housed all the utensils, and next to it was another drawer that held all the large utensils.
A cupboard underneath the drawers stored all the pots, pans, and lids, alongside all of the Tupperware. The rest was all miscellaneous and scattered about that changed day by day. Food was kept wherever food could be stored that wasn't needed to be in the fridge.
All in all, the kitchen was rather tidy, and it better have been, especially after all the crap that had been cleaned out of it. Seriously, she had never wanted to see a dirty dish for at least the next 48 hours.
"Let me guess, stressed out?" Susan asked as Jolyne peeled back the banana and took a bite, humming in affirmation, which only made Susan raise an eyebrow. "Why would you be stressed out?"
Swallowing the banana in her mouth, Jolyne glanced over at her mother and stared at her with a look that screamed "you should know". "My birthday is coming up and I've got no plans! I usually have something, but this year I've been… procrastinating."
"You could always hit the lake?"
"We've done that for the last three years."
"What about at Ramanos? You used to love going there!"
"What am I, twelve?" Jolyne quipped, taking another bite out of her banana.
"Work with me here, Jolyne," Susan sighed as she poured herself a second cup of coffee. "There isn't much that can be done here, and our house isn't big enough to host a party."
"Why not? You and Dad can go spend the night at his parents, and I get the house for myself. Hold a small party with my friends. I mean, I'm turning 19, Mom. It's a big thing! A big thing like that should call for an actual party and not some get together at a random pizza joint."
"And one of those friends happens to be a rather attractive man," Susan said as Jolyne blanched.
"MOM!"
"What! I can call a spade a spade," Susan replied with a shrug as Jolyne scowled.
"Yeah, so? Besides, I don't even swing that way. It's not like we're gonna have sex for God sake. That's just weird. He's like a brother to me. If anything, I'd soon rather let Megan hit than ever let Eric stick his junk anywhere near me," Jolyne replied as Susan rolled her eyes.
"That's just a phase, Jolyne. You'll grow out of it," Susan replied as Jolyne's scowl deepened. She didn't comment on it, she just stood up, grabbed her book bag, slung it over her shoulder and grabbed her wallet. She slipped on her shoes and headed toward the front door. "Wait, Jolyne, it's not—"
"Bye."
And with that she exited the house and began her walk to school. As she walked, she could feel her frustrations begin to boil over. She was getting sick of this. What was so hard to understand that she liked girls instead liking guys?
Don't get her wrong, Jolyne liked guys, but only as friends. She never saw any reason to be romantically involved with them. She could understand why people did, but she couldn't understand wanting to tie yourself to one and marry them. Especially when she had seen just how toxic men could be.
Now, granted, women were much the same if not worse at times. But at least with dating a woman you didn't run the risk of getting accidently knocked up and carrying a child or being made to have an abortion.
And, yes she knew that there were ways to avoid that in the first place, but that wasn't the point. The point was that she had no interest in having someone's pecker wedged inside of her if she ever wanted to have the "adult" kind of fun.
"Bullshit. It's all a buncha bullshit…" Jolyne muttered. It was 6:50, meaning she had over an hour of time to kill. She could loiter around the school and wait for her friends, or she could go over to 7/11 and get a coffee. It was only two bucks, and she had thirty left over from her built up allowance over the course of the year.
Thinking about that reminded her just how broke she was...
"I should really think about getting a job," Jolyne thought as she began to make her way towards where the 7/11 was located. By the time she got to the store and got her coffee, and by the time she made it back out, it was already 7:10. There had been a bit of a line-up with people getting gas and the store clerk having to bring out a fresh pot of that self-serve coffee.
She took a sip of her coffee; 3 sugars and two vanilla creams, but rather than feeling refreshed she felt... nothing. It was weird, because just like the banana, while it tasted good, it didn't sate her. Jolyne sighed. She was rapidly finding out that being a vampire was a lot more annoying than she thought.
She needed to feed soon, and that alone scared her.
What was she going to do?
She didn't want to hurt someone, but it was starting to look like she wasn't going to have a choice.
Slumping down on the sidewalk, her coffee beside her, Jolyne frowned, staring at the ground. That was when her eyes drifted over to someone who she had never seen before. They were a man, with extremely pale skin, ash white hair and purple eyes. He was dressed in a zebra print unbuttoned button-up, underneath which he wore no shirt, exposing heavily detailed muscles and a set of six-pack abs.
He had a soul patch on his chin, and he wore a pair of golden framed sunglasses that rested on the bridge of his nose. To complete his look, he wore a pair of baggy brown cargo shorts. In his hand was a vial of some red liquid that he nudged toward her. "You look like your struggling," the man whispered as Jolyne blinked.
"Huh…?"
"Take it. I don't need it. I fed recently," the man said as Jolyne stared at what now she realized was a vial of blood. Standing up, Jolyne began to walk past him, discreetly taking the vial from him. As she did, he smirked. "Hilbert. And you?"
"Jolyne."
"Us Vampires… We need to stick close to each other. Just remember this when I need help and I come seeking you out," Hilbert said before walking off in the opposite direction of Jolyne. Looking down at the vial, it said it contained 237 milliliters, or just about half a pint. It wasn't much, but it would be more than enough until she needed to feed tomorrow and not leave her with nothing.
Popping the cap off the vial, Jolyne was quick to down the entire thing, not leaving a single drop. She was quick to note just how sweet it tasted. Unlike the man who she had accidentally killed where it tasted like strawberry juice, this tasted more like sweetened vanilla.
"I wonder why?" Jolyne mused, looking at the stained vial, stuffing it into the small pocket in her book bag. By the time she made it back to the school, Kootenay River Secondary School to be precise, it was 7:15. It was still an hour and twenty five minutes away from her needing to be there. But now a few people had gathered by the smoke pit, all of whom she had recognized.
Walking over, one of the people there noticed her and smiled. "Ay! Jojo!"
The person in question was Eric. He had short, crew cut blond hair, blue eyes, and peach coloured complexion. He was dressed in a short sleeve shirt, alongside a pair of jeans and a set of black work boots. He was a bit on the muscular side, but that was due to the fact that he played rugby and was on the schools team.
"Sup, Eric! Please tell me you have it this time," Jolyne practically begged, clinging onto his right arm as Eric laughed.
"Yeah, yeah, I got it. Its in my pocket," Eric said as Jolyne smiled, reaching into his right pocket and pulling out a pack of John Players standard regular. She pulled a cigarette out as Eric handed her the lighter. She lit the cig before taking a slight drag out of it, some slipping from her lips as she sighed.
"Oh yeah, that's the stuff…"
"Jeez, you're acting like you haven't smoked in weeks. Can't go two days without it, can you?" Eric said, a teasing hint to his voice as Jolyne rolled her eyes.
"No, I just had a stressful last few days," Jolyne said as one of the smoke pit regulars, Dustin, chimed in.
"I heard you was attacked near Moore road. Got a nasty wound on yer neck. You good?" Dustin asked as Jolyne frowned. Dustin was an unremarkable guy—your standard redneck; always wore a hat to hide a mophead of brown hair, sun kissed skin from constantly being out in the sun, and wearing plaid flannels, jeans, and leather work boots. Today was no different, only this time the flannel was black instead of blue. He was smoking a joint, and already looked a little baked as is.
"Eh, it was just some druggy thinking I had his dope. I'm fine. He nicked me with a needle a few times but the doctors said I was fine," Jolyne replied, lying, because why the hell would she say anything about being attacked by a vampire? She pointed to the two needle point scars on her neck, a grimace taking up her expression. "See, nothing much."
"Coulda been a serial rapist. You're lucky, Jojo," Another regular, Judas, remarked. Despite the male name, Judas was a girl. She had long black hair, styled in dreads. She had brown skin and amber eyes, dressed in a white sleeveless crop top and a pair of jean shorts that rode up just above her thighs, alongside a pair of furred black boots. A pearl necklace hung around her neck, as well as a pearl wristband. She had a pink vape, which would explain the faint peach smell in the air.
Either that or it was her two-dollar perfume. Not that it mattered to Jolyne.
Taking another drag out of her cigarette, this time a longer one—up to half the cigarette—Jolyne chuckled. "Yeah, I guess. But Trevor was on his way, so even if he did manage to get me down, a police officer would've been there in less than five minutes."
"You put too much trust in the cops," Judas quipped, taking a hit from her vape. "I don't trust them as far as I can throw them."
"Of course you'd say that," Dustin remarked, earning a slap from Eric. "Oi, you clumsy fuck."
"Who said anything about being clumsy?" Eric said, scowling.
"Oh c'mon, it was a damn joke…"
"And not a very funny one," Judas said, sighing. "Whatever. Are you sure you're alright, Jolyne?"
"I said I was fine," Jolyne answered, finishing her cigarette before putting it out. "I'm heading out. Thanks for the cigs, Eric. You better show up to woodwork, or I'm gonna skin you. I can't handle being in a room with Mr. Spencer for more than five minutes."
"Yeah, yeah, I'll be there."
"You better be!"
And with that, and a rye smile on her face, Jolyne made her way toward the school, completely unaware of a certain golden-eyed boy watching her from afar.