He woke from his dreamless rest feeling as though he should be sore and aching. But his body was completely healed already. It was his mind that still bore open wounds. He hugged his knees miserably as he finally let himself remember what had happened. I should have gone back outside right at first. I should have... should have fought harder, or fought better. I should have done something, anything. Surely there was something I could have done. He started crying, tears trickling down his cheeks. But no, I was a weakling, like I've always been. My whole life is one long pathetic series of letting somebody use me. This is just... just the latest. That's all. I shouldn't be surprised. What have I ever accomplished? I was a bullied nobody in school, and then I was a cowed nothing of a wage-slave, and then I was a vampire's victim, and now I'm a rape victim.

He sobbed harder, curling up tightly.

He stayed in the bed all that night, too depressed and miserable to move. He ran through the scene a thousand times, sometimes trying to think of how he could have changed things, sometimes merely wallowing in misery and horror. He found peace only when daylight once more allowed him to sleep.

When he woke on the second day the images of what had been done to him once more started playing through his mind, the shame, pain, humiliation, and misery all still fresh. He whimpered. Gods. I can't live like this. I can't spend every night just huddling in misery. I'm pathetic enough as it is, I don't want to spend the rest of my life doing nothing but remembering one night. It was just one night. Not even an hour... I have to think about other things.

He slowly rose from the bed and began to pace around the room. What do I have to think about though? Nothing. I don't have any friends or family. I don't have any real talents. Even my art... He looked at the blank canvas and sighed. He couldn't even begin to think what he might paint. There were no ideas, no inspiration. The only thing I do besides sit around is hunt...

That was another thought he didn't really want to think about. Hunting meant attacking other people. He knew... he knew even better now than he'd known before what it was like to be a victim. Shame and guilt welled up in him. He was treating other people as he had been treated. How could he do it? Once again he thought of trying to kill himself. It would be and end to the misery of being a victim, an end to the memories, as well as an end to the guilt of assaulting others. But as horrible as his life was he still couldn't quite bring himself to do it. Something in him still wanted to live. And I guess if I'm going to live, I'm going to have to learn to live with what happened...

He paused by the door. He could go out. He didn't have to hunt, he could just walk. He didn't need to fear ordinary people, or even ordinary predators out on the street. Other vampires were the only ones stronger than he. But to go out he would have to go down the stairs and across the lobby. He shivered. No. But I can't just stay in here and never go out again...

He glanced over at the window. It was boarded up, but surely he could do something about that. A few minute's investigation showed that the bottom two boards could be easily pried off. He pulled them inside so that he could replace them when morning came. There were a few shards of glass remaining in the frame. He carefully pried them free. Then he stuck his head out of the narrow gap he now had and looked down. He grinned. As he had hoped there was a fire escape just to his right. He had a good head for heights, so it was no trouble to slip out through the gap, his slender frame fit easily, and swing himself over to the fire escape. Descent from there was ridiculously easy. Soon he was walking down the street, under the orange glow of the streetlights. Quite a lot of them were out, leaving the street dappled with irregular puddles of light and darkness. But he could see in the dark as if it were day.

He wandered aimlessly through the darkened streets. He had hunted here for four months. Roughly two dozen expeditions out into the night, to find a victim. But he had been focused on finding someone, he hadn't really looked around. And before that... before he had been looking only for danger, and had stuck to the shortest route home. He didn't really know the city, for all the years he'd lived there.

He explored it now. It was largely deserted at night. Vampires weren't the only predators out on these streets and the ordinary folk didn't often venture out after dark. But there was still a night life here. He found a number of bars, some of them revealed only when a patron entered or exited, their windows shuttered, keeping in the light.

There were others that advertised themselves more openly, with bright neon signs. He wondered at the reasons for that difference, but he didn't venture into any of them. He didn't know what he would do in a bar. He had a little money, he'd never spent the last of his funds. What was there to spend them on? He could go in and buy a drink but... what if somebody realized what he was? Would he be scorned? Thrown out? Attacked? And even if he wasn't, what would he say to the people there? So he just passed them by.

Midnight had passed and the night was slowly slipping towards morning when Andrew heard a soft, startled cry from somewhere nearby. He knew that sound. His own victims had often made that sound. It had come from somewhere ahead of him. For a moment he considered turning back the way he had come, but something, he wasn't sure what, urged him to seek it out, so he continued. Soon his path crossed the mouth of a narrow alleyway, and looking down it he saw two figures. One was a canine, his pose cowed, fearful. The other was a bull, broad-shouldered and broad-horned, who loomed over the other aggressively. He had a knife in his hand, which he waved threateningly.

Andrew hardly thought about what he should do. He just moved. He moved fast, reaching the bull while the man was only beginning to turn. Andrew grabbed his knife hand in steel-strong grip, and his other arm went around the bull's throat, pinning him. And then, as much out of habit as anything else, he bit into the bull's neck.

The bull's victim cringed back, wide-eyed, and then turned and fled. Andrew hardly noticed. He was feeding, and all that he knew was the wonderful taste of blood. He took less this time than he usually did, it had only been two days since he had taken from Jen. But two days was long enough for the hunger to be there. Hunger never really left him, it began to creep back within hours of feeding. It was there now, even if it wasn't overwhelmingly strong yet, and so he drank eagerly, taking his fill.

Finally he pulled back and let go. The bull jerked away from him and spun around to face him, panting, obviously both afraid and angry. They both stood there looking at each other, cervine turned predator and aggressive bovine, and Andrew wondered if he was going to be attacked. The moment stretched out, and finally Andrew had enough. He turned away and walked back down the alley. The bull didn't follow, and once Andrew reached the street he broke into a run, headed for home.

He slowed when he had put several blocks and several turns between himself and the mugger. As he walked he tried to assess his feelings. He felt very little guilt. I rescued that canine. I did something good, even if I also hurt somebody. The bull deserved to be attacked, since he was the one who attacked somebody else first. But... that train of thought led immediately to another. I attack people all the time. Does that mean that I deserved to be... to be assaulted and raped? He shivered, guilt and shame rising again. Did I deserve what happened to me? Maybe I did... But no. No. Nobody deserves that. That was... what they did was far worse than just being bitten. But... but if anybody did deserve it, I would.

He climbed the fire escape and swung across to his window and squeezed into his room. Dawn was coming, and he was glad. Going out had distracted him for a time from his dark thoughts, but depression still lingered and he couldn't keep himself from thinking about what had been done to him, and what he had done to others. He lay on the bed, and wished he could just cease, go away, stop existing. He didn't really want to die, but he didn't really want to live either. The world would be better without me in it.