Virelli Manor — Midnight
Alex adjusted his neural interface headset, eyes locked onto a dozen screens, each streaming encrypted footage from hacked private security feeds, traffic cams, and satellites.
A vampire.
Not just a myth, not just folklore—real, living among humans, masked by shadows and contracts with hidden organizations. But Alex had cracked them. He followed bloodless bodies, witness disappearances, facial patterns immune to aging.
Now, the equation was solved.
Target: Adrian Voss.
Alias: Dr. Elias Ward.
Occupation: Night-shift trauma surgeon at a private hospital in Brooklyn. Seventy-three confirmed facial matches across 104 years of photo records. Zero aging. Zero digital footprint before 1911.
DNA: Pureblood probability—92.8%.
Weaknesses: Ultraviolet exposure, iron-rich environments, psychic disruption pulses.
Strengths: Regeneration, enhanced neural speed, absolute silence.
Alex smiled faintly.
> "Perfect subject."
He tapped a control pad. The plan initiated.
---
Step One: Observation
Alex infiltrated the hospital's private network through a hijacked thermal satellite. He mapped Adrian Voss's movement patterns down to the second.
The vampire arrived exactly 7:58 p.m. each night. He avoided all major intersections. He never used identification cards—only physical presence.
At 3:12 a.m., he always took a five-minute "oxygen break" on the rooftop.
Not for smoke. For silence.
> "He pretends to be human so well," Alex whispered.
> "Let's see what breaks the illusion."
---
Step Two: Bait
Alex needed blood.
Not his own.
Not human.
He sourced four pints of high-oxygen hemoglobin-rich animal blood, carefully filtered to resemble that of a human with rare antigens—irresistible to vampires.
He programmed a remote delivery drone to drop a shattered blood pack in a nearby alley.
The scent would rise.
The predator would look.
> "Always test the craving," Alex muttered. "Instinct precedes caution."
On Night Three, Adrian paused mid-surgery and blinked rapidly—something only a high-stimulation neural reaction could trigger.
He requested a break.
He walked to the alley.
He sniffed the air.
He didn't feed.
But Alex saw it in his pupils.
Hunger.
---
Step Three: Trap Design
Adrian was cautious. Too old, too experienced for brute capture.
So Alex built a mobile chamber—a customized medical van shielded with UV-reactive nanopolymers, embedded with a psychic pulse emitter, and disguised as a blood donation vehicle.
It emitted a frequency tuned to confuse low-range supernatural senses. The interior was lined with iron-infused padding.
He called it:
Coffin 0.1
Alex only needed five minutes.
Five minutes of capture, three vials of blood, one neural scan.
The rest didn't matter.
---
Step Four: The Encounter
April 17th — 3:07 a.m. — Brooklyn Private Hospital Rooftop
Adrian stood at the rooftop edge, hands resting on the metal railing, eyes scanning the sleeping city.
He was calm, elegant in the way predators always were. Not a wrinkle on his face. Not a sound in his step.
Then the door behind him opened.
"Dr. Ward," came a young man's voice.
Adrian turned.
Alex stood in a white lab coat, an ID badge clipped to his chest.
> Alias: Jonathan Sykes, Junior Resident.
> Age: 22, background falsified, university credentials backdated and approved via bribe + cyber infiltration.
Adrian raised an eyebrow.
> "New transfer?"
Alex smiled.
> "Yes, sir. Sorry to interrupt. Just wanted to introduce myself."
Adrian looked at him for a long time.
> "You're not on the rotation."
> "I have clearance. Check with Director Olsen," Alex replied smoothly.
Adrian hesitated.
But then nodded.
> "Of course."
> "Beautiful night, isn't it?" Alex said, walking beside him.
Adrian remained silent.
---
Step Five: Detonation
Alex reached into his coat, touching the pulse switch.
> "You ever wonder what it means to be immortal?" he asked.
Adrian blinked.
> "Why do you ask?"
> "Because you're about to lose five minutes of eternity."
He pressed the switch.
The psychic disruption pulse blasted from the lab coat.
Adrian dropped to one knee, groaning, one hand to his temple.
> "W-what… are you—?"
Alex lunged.
Injected him with a paralytic agent synthesized from crushed silver nanoparticles and cortisol suppressants.
Adrian collapsed.
Still conscious.
But paralyzed.
Alex tapped his wrist.
The Coffin 0.1 screeched up to the curb below.
Two drones extended mechanical arms, lifted Adrian into the van.
Door slammed shut.
---
Step Six: Extraction
Unknown Location — Below Virelli Manor
Adrian was strapped to a reinforced chair. Not steel—cold iron, wrapped in arcane sigils stolen from a grimoire Alex decrypted last week.
Light pulsed faintly in the room. It wasn't harsh. But to Adrian, it burned like acid.
Alex sat in front of him, calm and collected.
> "Before you speak, yes—I know what you are."
Adrian growled. "You… have no idea what you're doing."
> "No," Alex corrected, "you have no idea what I'm doing."
He tapped the syringe chamber.
The first vial filled.
Dark red. Thicker than human blood. With microscopic particles swimming like oil in water.
> "Fascinating," Alex whispered. "Do you know how hard it was to confirm your kind existed?"
> "You won't live to use it," Adrian hissed.
Alex smiled. "Oh, I won't use it on myself. Not yet."
He pointed to a tank beside them—a clone embryo grown from Alex's own cells.
> "First, we test."
---
Step Seven: The Warning
Adrian's eyes narrowed.
> "You think you're clever. You think you've outplayed centuries of monsters."
> "But there are courts. Covens. Empires. You kidnapped one of their Elders."
Alex's interest peaked.
> "Elder, huh? I suspected that."
He leaned in close.
> "Let them come."
> "I want them to."
Adrian spat blood.
Alex calmly wiped it from his cheek.
> "You're a genius," Adrian said, tone shifting. "But you're arrogant. Arrogance kills."
Alex injected the final needle.
> "No. Mistakes kill. I don't make those."
---
Step Eight: Release?
Alex considered ending Adrian's life.
But something stopped him.
> "No. You're bait now."
He walked to the console and opened a remote cell inside the Virelli estate's artificial forest dome—an isolated environment 20 meters underground.
> "You'll live in luxury. You'll be watched."
> "And if your people come... I'll learn from them too."
---
Closing Scene
Back in his lab, Alex examined the DNA.
It was mutating—trying to consume itself, rewrite itself. Living code.
But he was ready.
> "We're going to dance, you and I," he whispered to the blood sample.
> "And then… I'll become something even your kind fears."
On his screen, the first hybrid embryo's cells began glowing faintly.
> Project Ascension: Phase One—Complete.