The wind hissed outside the window of the warehouse on 5th Avenue, in Midpoint California. The sun’s last light tinted the sky a deep, blood-red with hints of infection in the yellow-orange at the edges. It should have been disturbing, but Stephen actually found it soothing. The world revealed for what he believed it to be. Life. Pretending not be dying when it is already too late.

He sighed, leaning back in the chair he’d chosen to rest in after the feast, letting the bloody light not only fill the room he was in, but his eyes, and through them, saturate his brain in ruby-red.

It was a curious thing to have a physical body. It could feel so powerful, particularly backed by his magics. Yet it was still mortal, and fallible. And it required things his immaterial body had not. Which was frustrating, yes. But new, and, as he had just discovered… exciting.

His first kill lay in a darkened corner of the room, wasted blood soaking the carpet. He let his eyes linger over it. It felt wrong to leave it there in the darkness, for it had unveiled an epiphany.

To kill had been easier than he’d anticipated. Too quick. But the fear of the prey had been exhilarating. And the blood … so hot and fast and coppery. He’d known immediately that this, this flowing red river was to be the price he’d pay, quite willingly, for his stay on the planet. Every *jinn?* paid a price for a material body and the chance to infect the world with their ambitions, and the drinking of living blood would be his. How often, Stephen was still unsure. But he knew the human name for what he would be as he walked the Earth in physical form. Strigoi. Nosferatu. Vampire. He rather thought that he would enjoy that.

He felt a flash of sentimentality and part of him wished that he could keep that body there, as a keepsake, memorabilia of that most important moment. But he knew that likely, the humans waiting in the other room would remove it, as soon as they were sure it was safe to approach and clean away all traces of the deed because murder in this human world was illegal. And monsters, human or otherwise, needed to hide what they were.

Well, Stephen supposed, his memories would have to suffice.

He could hear them outside the door, in the room beyond, smelling like fear and excitement. Full of anticipation, and completely free of guilt. They had wisely left the room when they understood, at the last, that the demon they’d brought forth would take a life before it would “serve” them. Exiting quite quickly, just case Stephen might be tempted to take two. He chuckled.

Humans always assumed that the spirits they summoned would bow to their wills. Ridiculous. But he would help them. For a while anyway. It served his purposes to do so. He was fresh and new here, and allies were always wise when you were learning. And they were self-serving, amoral, power-hungry predators themselves. Which he appreciated. Hardly “human” at all. There had been almost no flinch of guilt when they left the weakest of their number to Stephen’s appetites. The “human” one, who chilled at the thought of murder as the price for personal power. Who had objected to the sacrifice of one of their number.

So they sacrificed him. Turning on him like a wolf-pack circling prey. Stephen remembered the look on his stupid, prey-face as they backed out of the room, abandoning him.

But that was rude, Stephen told himself. He really should be more appreciative. Fool or not, he’d been quite delicious.