I am over 600 years old now. I have seen a lot: wars, famines, and many seasons. I have prowled every night, drinking the blood of animals.
Humans, I used to, but then there were some reformations in the Vampire council, and so we were not allowed human blood. But as with everything in life, we adapted. We spread across the world and stayed in safe places, especially big bungalows and palaces. Those places fit our vibe.
I moved to South India, to a quiet hill station with bustling leaves and beautiful meadows. I got an old colonial bungalow to settle down in. Only the cook and caretaker knew who I was, and he too was mesmerized by my signature hypnosis power.
I had even managed to take an online Zoom call at night regarding Homer and the other Greek poets. But my specialty was romantic poets. I had managed to somehow memorize all the poems that they had written.
Great poets, actually.
Okay, there are plenty of stories to tell.
But I will refrain from them. What I am about to tell you is the recent uncomfortable situation that I am in. I have been living for a long time, and I have mentioned it already. The world is a dark place, and I have seen it all.
But there is another problem that is not addressed properly.
The terrible weather.
Now, I have a decent routine.
I wake up by 9 at night. Have my breakfast, and by 12, I am off hunting squirrels or rare deers in the mountains. I usually return by 2, and I go for a long flight to the lake. And sit on the boat, and it is quiet, silent, and pleasant when it is not raining. Then, I would fly back and see how my stocks are doing. I have been doing this for so long that I can predict the stock market returns.
I then, of course, relax, read, listen to Bach, and play the piano a little. By 5 in the morning, I am exhausted. I drink a pint of old blood, and I get to sleep.
But the problem now is that it is getting hot—very hot.
I can hardly sleep in my coffin. They have cut all the trees. I have no place to rest when I fly to the lake every night.
So, the heat has been extremely annoying, and I don’t know what to do about it. But one day, I was deep in sleep, rather uncomfortably, in my stuffy coffin. Why a coffin, you ask? It is a safety measure. Normally, people don’t just open coffins, and it reminds me of my immortality.
I usually don’t get out of my coffin, but for emergencies, I have to. So, one particular hot afternoon, I was laying down in my coffin, and then I heard a weird but welcoming noise. So, I woke up and saw from my camera that there was a group of antlers. And one of them was hurt and was laying in front of my garden. Well, I decided to call my cook to let him know that there was a deer dying, but he seemed to be missing as well.
I searched for them throughout the bungalow, but I couldn’t find him. I wondered where he could be, but then it just struck me that perhaps he knew I was not going to wake up, so he was probably doing some other job by now. And so, I went and checked my footage and understood that my wonderful servant had been escaping work daily. But then, this was really awkward. But then, my senses kept telling me that this animal was suffering. There’s not much I could do about it. So, I kept waiting. I tried to go back to sleep, but I couldn’t because of the wretched heat.
I became hungry. I suddenly had the urge to go rescue the animal but also drink its blood. It’s been so long since I had some fresh blood, you know. This was tempting. I tried to call my servant once more, but there was no response. I was becoming frustrated, maybe my hypnotic power was growing weak. The smell of blood with the breezy waves filled my nostrils. I couldn’t bear it any longer, so I got an umbrella, some gloves, covering myself as much as possible, and I went out. As I drew near, I sensed a vague feeling of being watched. I looked around, and as I was about to soothe the pain-filled deer, it transformed into a middle-aged woman wrapped in a pink velvet shawl, looking at me in disbelief.
I was about to turn myself into a bat when two strong hands grabbed me and handcuffed me. There was something magical about the handcuffs that even when I tried to change into a bat, nothing was happening.
“We have been hunting you for a long time,” she chuckled.
“What do you want?” I asked, frustrated.
“You really thought you could escape your wrongdoings…the war,” she became serious.
“That is a bygone era,” I spat out.
They took me to the car, and I wondered what had happened to my servant. I chastised myself for waking up in the morning. If I didn’t bother about the heat, I would have slept happily, and I would not be in any of this trouble.
The silence in the car was unusual. No noise of the engine. It was like flying.
“This road is a bumpy road, but I don’t feel anything?” I snorted.
“We are not taking another road to the helipad,” she replied. But suddenly, the car came to a halt.
“What is it?” the woman asked, irritated.
“A man is in front of the car,” the driver said sheepishly. I looked, and to my amusement, it was my trusted servant.
“Gusto Ganesh,” I yelled.
But there was no need for it, as the servant was hauled into the car and was put under a mute spell.
“Not what we planned, but we could use a servant,” she said.
I tried to mind-talk to my servant and ask him where he had been. He was scared as hell seeing me in the car.
“Where have you been, you idiot?” I asked.
He looked at me, thinking I had spoken loudly.
“Sir,” he tried, but because of the mute spell, he remained silent. Then I heard him.
“Today, there was a market in the village. I went out there,” he thought.
“Great!” I thought back.
“What’s happening, sir? I can hear you, but we both are not talking?”
“We are being kidnapped,” I shouted in my head.
“Why, sir? What did we do?”
I didn’t reply; he was tiring.
After some time, I heard him thinking, “Did I leave the gas on?”
“No, it was off,” I sent my thoughts to him. He looked startled.
“Sir, what are we going to do now?”
They took us to the top of the mountain, and to my surprise, there was a helipad. How on earth did I miss that?
The helicopter started to move higher, and that was when I did the ultimate trick. When I knew that we were over the lake, I turned into a bat and flew out. Gusto Ganesh looked at me with shock.
“You are under a spell. How can you change?” shouted the woman frantically.
Gusto Ganesh, without thinking, jumped out following my cue. As he headed down to the lake, I realized the water had all gone. Gusto would die in this fall. I flew down as fast as I could, cursing the light. As a bat, I had no power to pull him. He was going to crash and die. Only if I could change into myself by reaching the bottom first.
I changed and hit the shallow water, and the heavy body of Gusto landed on me.
I woke up startled.
“Is it the fall again, sir?” Gusto entered the room.
He brought two cups of blood for the night.
“You know that day when you fell and were about to die in the lake, I couldn’t think of anything else. I had to make you a vampire. But now I regret it.”
“Why, sir? I am forever indebted to you…”
“The house is a mess, Gusto. You sleep the entire day, and at night, you come with me to hunt. First, it was hot, now my house stinks. We need to get a new servant.”
“That can be arranged, sir?”
“Really?”
Gusto came back with a stave and thrust it into the aged vampire’s heart.
“I saved you,” I told him.
“Yes, humans can be heartless sometimes.”
But poor Gusto, I have been lying about everything, lying about the sun destroying us, lying about the magical handcuffs, and now this fool is thinking he could kill me with a stave into my heart.
I was there when paradise was created, and I was there when paradise was lost. I am 6000 years old.
When all of these humans are destroying paradise, I am still here.
Copyrighted @ Ronald Hadrian 2024