This is What We Call a Tragedy

Again, I awoke in darkness, it appeared to be a basement. I groaned slightly as my head pounded and everything still ached. I tried to sit up and let out a whimper as a flash of pain shot up my side.

“Lizzi?” I heard a familiar voice call out.

“F-frank?” I replied, straining my eyes through the darkness.

I felt his arm snake around my side carefully, “Shit, I’ve been so worried about you. Are you okay?”

I shook my head, “I think I broke a rib...”

He looked me over, a hand touching near my eyebrow, I could see blood on his finger tips, “Shit, what did they do to you?”

I bit my lip nervously, which caused me to flinch since I still had an open cut there from earlier. “...Everything,” I said softly.

I saw his eyes go from worried to furious, “What do you mean?” I couldn’t say it out loud, to say it out loud made it all the more true. I just broke down sobbing into Frank’s shoulder. He rubbed my back gently, his arms around me in a comforting manner as he tried to console me. “I’ve got you now, it’s going to be okay,” he whispered. “We’ll think of something...”

I nodded slightly and took a few deep breaths, “W-where’s Jamia?” Frank simply looked at the ground and shook his head, his facial expression contorted into the most painful thing I’ve ever seen. I felt my heart stop, and more tears well up in my eyes, “No...” I squeaked.

“Yeah,” he said softly, looking away. “When they came to the house the other day, they took me and killed her... I’ve been a mess, thinking about it and worrying that they’d done the same to you...” He paused for a moment before slamming his fist into the concrete wall, “I should’ve done more, I couldn’t even get out of Mikey and Ray’s hold to help her...”

I took his hand, which was now bleeding. “Frank, you could’ve done anything,” I said softly. “Trust me... I couldn’t even get away from Gerard... and he was only holding me down with one hand... It’s all my fault...” I whispered.

“How is any of this your fault?!” Frank asked, seemingly offended that I had even thought that.

“If I never knew you two, or if I was gone or dead... This never would’ve happened!”

“Don’t say that,” Frank said, “you’re my best friend, you were Jamia’s best friend...”

We sat in silence for a moment before I looked over at Frank, “I don’t want you getting hurt...”

“I don’t want you getting hurt either, I’m not sure we can prevent that though...” he said honestly.

“Yes we can,” I said, looking down. “Frank, they want me... They need me for their prophecy or whatever, that’s why they need you as well... If I’m dead---”

“Don’t!” Frank growled. “Don’t even think about it Liz!”

“Why not?! It’s true! If I was to die, they wouldn’t need you, you’d be okay...” I yelled right back.

“No I wouldn’t. My fiancé is dead, and then my best friend is dead too? The only two fucking people that give a shit about me? And don’t be so fucking naïve, Liz, if you killed yourself, you’re right, they wouldn’t need me... They’d kill me, so then you’d be dead for no fucking reason,” he said, his tone softening at the end.

“Well it doesn’t matter then, because in three days, we’re going to be ‘dead’ any ways,” I muttered. “Once the full moon comes, they’ll turn us into one of them... You need to get out of here Frank, you need to get away... If I got pregnant from Gerard... They’ll kill you and I’ll be bound to him...” I said softly.

“How do you know when they’re turning us?” he asked, raising a brow.

I shrugged, “I did some internet research...”

“You researched vampires?” he asked in a ‘what the fuck’ tone.

I gave another shrug, “What? Come on, what else could I do? There’s got to be someone out there who knows about them.”

Frank sighed and shook his head, “We need to get out of here, especially you... You’re a mess.”

“Gee, thanks, you look good too,” I said sarcastically, but moved the wrong way, causing another shooting pain in my abdomen. “Fuck,” I muttered.

“Our best chance is to try and get out of here during the day,” he said softly, looking down at his wrist watch, “It’s night, now, and they’ll be back any minute... Tomorrow we can make an attempt... The next full moon is in three days,” he said.

“How the fuck are we going to get out Frank?” I asked looking around. “You don’t think they’ve thought of us getting out? You don’t think they’ve planned for this? They probably have any exit sealed off in this house.”

“We’re not in a house, Lizzi,” he said cautiously. “I know where the only entrance is, and they need to move in and out of it daily. Mikey usually stands post outside of it at night, but they switch off sometimes. He can’t here us though, which is good. During the day, we’ll have a better opportunity to escape because they can’t come out into the light, they don’t know we know that. In fact, they’ve tried to convince us they can, but I think it’s all a bluff, otherwise, they wouldn’t only be out during the night.”

“If we’re not in a house... where are we?” I asked in a somewhat frightened voice, almost knowing the answer already.

“We’re in a tomb, Liz, in the cemetery, in the cliché hideout...” he said honestly. “They figured it would be the last place anyone would look, so it worked.”

“What are we going to do when we get out?” I asked. “They’ll come after us!”

Frank smiled, “Like you said, Lizzi, someone out there has got to know something about vampires...”

“You’ve been watching ‘Buffy’ too much,” I frowned.

“Oh, come on Lizzi, it’s pretty fucking clear they’re real... There’s got to be someone that knows how to fight them,” Frank protested.

“Frank, you can’t just go in the yellow pages and look up ‘Vampire Killer,’” I said in disbelief.

“It’s worth a shot... Even if we can’t find anyone to help, we have to be able to find a way to help ourselves, Lizzi. We can plan this... We can fight them!” he said with conviction.

I nodded slightly, “Frank, if you think we can do it... Then I’ll give it a shot...”