text: [Themes: horror]
  
  You smacked your lips and clicked your tongue. Your mouth was bone dry. You looked around for something to eat, but there was nothing. You stepped forward, and your foot landed in a puddle of your own blood. You looked down to find that the ground where you fell had collected a small reservoir of blood.
  
  Suddenly, your instinct brought you to your knees. You scooped up some of your own blood with both hands and poured it into your mouth. The taste was bitter and metallic, but you liked it. You scooped more blood into your mouth, and drank until there was nothing left. The ground was bone-dry, and you searched around for any more blood, and found nothing. Your blood did little to satisfy you, and you jumped to the next possible source: other people. You didn't know how long you were unconscious, but it was still dark out, so you could hunt.
  
  As you slowly began to move forward, your joints felt tired and achy, like you'd just finished running a marathon. You felt heavy, as though you were struggling to support the weight of your own body. As you shambled in the direction of your home, your primal urges died out, and common sense came back. You at least had control over your thoughts again.
  
  You'd switched sides. You realized that. Rather than protecting your family and living a human life, your purpose was now to eat until you were full, which you had a feeling wouldn't happen for awhile. The pit in your stomach was large and painful, and you doubted that if you ate everyone in the neighborhood that it would satisfy you.
  
  Suddenly, another thought struck you: the Hunters didn't eat their prey. Presumably, you were the product of whatever they wanted, and you hadn't been eaten. So why were you hungry? You slowly began to realize how little you understood the creatures that plagued the earth. They couldn't just be here to wipe humans off the planet, otherwise they wouldn't be so respectful of the houses and boundaries that humans built. If the Hunters wanted to, they could easily tear through the houses' walls and take whatever they wanted.
  
  Then, another thought emerged: you just witnessed a Hunter jump through a window, something you'd never heard of. Were they learning? The thought sent chills up your spine, but thinking made you hungry. It was harder to produce coherent thoughts now, and they came slowly, one at a time.
  
  Before long, you ended up at the edge of your neighborhood. You gazed out at the rows of houses still illuminated by all kinds of lights. Your eyes began to widen and you tensed up at the knowledge of nearby food. But then, another thought permeated your consciousness. You weren't sure you wanted this. Every instinct told you to go out and eat your friends and family, the ones you were just protecting not too long ago. You fought the feeling and tried to maintain rational thought.
  
  Another thought floated to the surface of your brain: you could protect them. You could use your new state to keep them safe. If you survived having a piece of your neck ripped out, you could survive against invading Hunters. If only you could find another way to sustain yourself, you wouldn't fall victim to whatever the Hunter did to you. You wouldn't become a mindless killer like the rest. You would just have to fight the onset of madness.
  
  A woman stepped out of her house, onto the road. Immediately, you dropped to your hands and knees. As much as you wanted to be a hero, you were hungry. An unsuspecting meal sat right in front of you. You'd have no problem overpowering her.
  
  > feed Yourself
  As much as you loved your family, you weren't like them anymore. You were hungry. You promised yourself you would at least try to fight it off later, but for now, you needed blood. The increasing promise of food made you salivate, and brought some feeling back to your body. You felt stronger now.
  
  You sprung to your feet and ran for the woman. It wasn't until you almost had her that you realized you had no idea how to drink blood. The thought was slow to emerge, slower than your impulses. You seized her and threw her over your shoulder, and turned to bolt for the woods. As you took off, you could hear the woman's husband behind you, calling for help.
  
  You ignored the cries and ran into the woods, deeper into the darkness. Eventually, your energy started to drain. You dropped the woman and held her to the ground. You studied her, looking for an optimum spot to draw blood. You settled on her neck, and bit down hard. Your teeth were still dull and flat, so it took some effort to tear the skin. Once you passed the muscle tissue, blood began to spurt from the wound.
  
  You drank as much as you could. The woman flailed and struggled at first, and then slowly relaxed. Within a few minutes, there was nothing left. You wiped your mouth on your sleeve, satisfied. You weren't full, far from it, but this first official meal had helped tremendously. You studied the woman's lifeless body, wondering if it would come back to life like you did.
  
  It didn't take long for your rational thought to come back over the rush of the hunt, and the full weight of what you just did crashed onto you. You knew this woman. You knew her husband, her kid, and you just killed her. As you searched your mind for hate and guilt, you were surprised to find almost none. You understood what you'd done, but you didn't care. You looked at your own hands, now stained with blood, and wondered if you could even consider being human any longer.
  
  You sat in the darkness for awhile, before hunger made you rise again. Your quiet, timid voice of reason was being drowned out by your instinct to hunt, but the reason was still there. You had to eat, but you couldn't bring yourself to kill again. Could you?
  
  > Of Course
  Just a short time ago, you were human, just like the woman you just drank the blood of. And yet, you felt no sorrow or guilt. You looked at your hands again, and at the woman's body. Perhaps it was the natural order. You had failed as a human. The Hunter took you, and made you into a monster. Perhaps that was how it was supposed to be. It was the natural order of things. Your job before was to fight the Hunters, but now? Food. Food was your only constant thought, your only focus. The sun was still nowhere in sight, and your neighborhood was a stone's throw away.
  
  Leaving your humanity on the ground next to the woman's body, you walked back to your neighborhood. Surprisingly, nobody had gone after the woman. When you got to the treeline and looked in on the neighborhood, you could see that more guards had been posted, with guns. Through a window in the house of the woman you ate, you can see her husband crying, being consoled by your wife.
  
  Your wife.
  
  The edges of your vision blurred with anger. It was natural this time, a natural transition into hunting mode. You sprinted up to the house and flung yourself through the window. You didn't know whether you wanted to attack the man or your wife, but you didn't have to make the choice. Your wife left the room quickly, while the man stumbled over, caught off guard by your entrance. You beat the man to the door and slammed it shut.
  
  The man's eyes, puffy and wet with tears, were now bulged open. He was quaking in fear. You swiftly pushed him over, ripped his throat open, and began to drink. The man put up more fight than the woman, but was still as powerful as a beached tuna fish. You drank his blood until there was nothing left in him, and then wiped your mouth on your sleeve again. You left his body in the room and jumped back out the window. Once outside, you could see that the remaining guards were just entering the house through its front door.
  
  You disappeared into the woods, much stronger now. With every meal you felt more in control, stronger than before. While you doubted you could keep coming back to your own neighborhood without being caught and killed, you still needed more food. The immense amount of blood you had just consumed felt like nothing more than a single graham cracker, whetting your appetite. You needed another feeding ground, so you set off, away from your neighborhood.
  
  Pretty soon, sunlight began to flood the air, illuminating the world around you. You hadn't been thinking about the sun at all since your second kill, and for a brief moment you worried it would kill you. After a few seconds, nothing happened. You weren't sure what you were expecting, but the sunlight seemed to have no effect on you at all. It made you slightly curious as to why the Hunters hid during the day, but the thought quickly died. You didn't care. You were hungry.
  
  As the sun grew higher in the sky, you kept traveling through the woods for a long time, even passing a road at one point. You were focused entirely on finding more humans, so your pupils dilated when you heard voices. You raced to the origin of the sound to find that it was a neighborhood. Its inhabitants were just waking up, apparently checking to see if anyone had been taken.
  
  They were standing in a group, a huge mass of humans, all talking to each other. They were unfocused, thinking they were safe since the sun was up. You licked your lips and lowered yourself among the brush to hide. Your hunger was fierce now, but even in your primal state you knew you couldn't just start tearing through the mob. There were too many people, and you didn't want to get killed.
  
  You sat and waited for awhile. The humans finished their meeting and split up, returning to their homes. They were all getting ready for their normal days, kids getting dressed for school and adults dressing for work. It was strange watching the humans perform the very same dull routines you had once been a part of, but you were free now. It was almost amusing, seeing them monotonously prepare for the day.
  
  It was entertaining, sure, but your appetite only grew. You became impatient, wishing one of them would come outside to water their plants or something, or leave their kids alone inside. The humans dawdled, hugging each other and saying goodbye. You mocked them from inside your head, urging them to give you an opening.
  
  > wait Your Turn
  Your impulse was practically pulling you towards the nearest window, but you fought the feeling back. You needed to wait for the right moment, to avoid being interrupted during your feast. You sat in the brush and counted the number of windows on the nearby houses.
  
  Mercifully, the family of the nearest house went their separate ways, with the children presumably walking to school, and the man getting in his car and driving off to work. A lone woman remained in the house, folding laundry. Your mouth began to water as you crept over to the outer wall of the house. You sat underneath a window, hidden from the human's view.
  
  Pretty soon, the human came outside carrying garden supplies. She began to fill a watering can from a hose mounted on the side of the house. Her back was turned to you, and she was on her hands and knees. You swiftly crossed the backyard and grabbed her by the throat, tearing it open with your fingernails. She could barely scream before you had emptied her of blood.
  
  Your arms and legs were tingling from the kill. You knew that you needed to take every life from this neighborhood before you could even think about going anywhere else. Although you needed it to live, you had developed a drug-like tolerance to murder, and this was only....your second kill? Third? It didn't matter. Your searches for empathy or any feeling at all towards your victims kept coming up empty, so you stopped looking.
  
  You moved to the next house, where a human was sitting outside on his front porch, alone. You stayed behind a row of bushes lining the front yard, then vaulted over the railing and sunk your teeth into the man's neck. Once again, you were too quick for him to make a peep. You drank him dry, and entered the house through the unlocked front door.
  
  When you stepped inside, another human approached you, expecting that her husband had just come back. Upon seeing you, she screamed and ran back into the kitchen. The noise alerted the humans outside, and they came running to the woman's aid. They saw the dead man, they saw you, the horrid creature you had become, and it fueled their anger.
  
  Reacting quickly to protect your own life, you bounded up the stairs. You blindly darted down hallways and into rooms. Eventually, you found a walk-in closet. You stepped inside and closed the door after you, hiding among the racks of coats. You could hear commotion from downstairs as the humans came running to find you. Of course, they failed. They searched around the house and outside, and found no trace of you.
  
  You were eager to kill the woman downstairs, and so urged the other humans to leave so you could have your meal. You could hear them downstairs, apologizing to the woman and grieving. You were tuning them out when a piece of conversation caught your ear. It was one human vocalizing confusion over how you had hunted during the day. The humans had known daytime to be safe. Now, they were unsure, and as frightened as ever.
  
  The humans agreed to meet up and talk about it later. Then, one by one, they left the house. You could hear the sounds of the woman crying softly to herself. You sighed in relief, and made your way out of the closet. You raced downstairs to find the woman still in the kitchen. There was no thrill element in killing this time, just a very calculated bite to the throat, and you drank her blood.
  
  After that was done, your hunger seemed to be growing. You were no longer in control of yourself, your lust for blood was. You opened the front door and looked outside to see if anybody was nearby. Suddenly, a fierce and powerful pain erupted across your face and arm, causing you to pull back into the house. The burn was intense, and you struggled not to cry out and reveal your location. You looked at the front door in bewilderment, wondering what had just happened.
  
  After a few minutes, the sharp pain subsided into dull agony, and you were able to move again. You slowly opened the door, trying to see what had caused the pain. You had initially thought it was a spray of some kind, like mace, but the true culprit became clear when sunlight fell on your face and the burning was reignited. You stepped back inside, this time knowing to close the door.
  
  They stayed inside because the sun burned. That was why. The realization came after the pain had vanished once more, and you knew you were in trouble. You couldn't leave the house or you'd likely be burned alive. That meant if another group of humans came in, you'd have to hide until they left. But, more importantly, you couldn't eat anymore unless lone humans came into the house. You were stuck. There was nothing more to do about the situation but wait until nightfall.
  
  > Darkness
  The humans left the house alone for the remainder of the day, allowing you to remain undisturbed, hiding in an upstairs room. The wait for the sun to set was agonizingly slow, and when the sunlight finally disappeared, you were all too eager to leave the house out the back door, ready to hunt again.
  
  The humans had already barricaded themselves in their houses. Doors were locked, windows were barricaded, and lights coming from upstairs windows told you that they were still awake, watching for signs of danger. You stayed away from the streetlights, waiting from the darkness for a chance to feed. At some point, someone would have to come outside or slip up somehow, and you were ready for it.
  
  Your hunger became worse as the night dragged on, fueled by previous kills and lusting for more blood. There weren't any humans in sight, but there were still lights on in the houses, keeping you at bay. You would have to get creative. Approaching the next inhabited house, you circled the building looking for entry points. The humans seemed to have learned quickly, as every grate and window was sealed perfectly. You could hear voices by pressing your ear against the house's walls, the humans milling uselessly around inside, denying you the right to feed.
  
  Suddenly, a noise from behind caused you to turn around and face the trees behind you. Your eyes scanned the dark woods for threats, but you couldn't see anything. You stared for another few seconds, until a large outline began to appear right in front of you. A Hunter had found the neighborhood. It silently approached the the back of the house, and you immediately moved to aid it.
  
  You could almost tell the Hunter's intentions, like you were reading its mind. You were undoubtedly linked to them somehow, and the connection just kept growing stronger. You could read it perfectly; the Hunter intended to forcefully enter the home through a window, and was searching for a weak barricade.
  
  The Hunter moved slowly, swaying back and forth like a lone flower in a breeze. Then, it suddenly snapped into action, having made a selection. You could see the Hunter's attack before it happened, and bounded for the weak window. The Hunter's claws tore the glass and boards like paper, leaving a gaping hole in the wall for you to climb through. The Hunter followed closely after, slipping its slender body through the gap.
  
  Once inside, you could tell the humans were on the second floor, as furniture had been piled up on the stairs. You hardly considered three chairs an obstacle, and climbed over them quickly. The Hunter followed you slowly, almost as if it was letting you take the lead. It loomed closely behind you as you raced up the stairs. Once at the top, you were able to hear the humans making noise in one of the rooms.
  
  You beat the Hunter into the room and attacked the nearest human, which happened to be a young woman. She barely resisted at all, and you easily overpowered her. A bigger human wielding some sort of sharp blade stepped forward to stab you, but the Hunter picked the human up before he could do anything. You drank the blood of the woman while the Hunter carried the other human downstairs and outside.
  
  After the hunt's adrenaline wore off, you realized you and the Hunter had worked together in a sort of weird way. You could both sense each other's next move and act accordingly, and you were able to take down a couple by working together. You couldn't remember ever seeing this as a human, but that didn't matter. The Hunters were evolving, and with it you gained new abilities and an even stronger thirst for blood.
  
  You could feel the Hunter bounding away with the terrified human in its jaws. The Hunter's simplistic mind was focused on the anticipation of a fresh kill, and you got to watch it play out from inside the house. Eventually, the connection faded as the Hunter moved further away. It was satisfied with its hunt, but you weren't. There were still live bodies in the neighborhood.
  
  Eventually, you realized you needed to get out of the house before the other humans showed up. You ran down the stairs and escaped out the window in time to see a group forming on the front porch. You disappeared into the woods and waited for the excitement to die down. It took about an hour for the mob to disperse, but nobody went back into their homes. Instead, they stayed on the roads, holding their weapons defensively.
  
  They were getting smarter. You wouldn't be able to steamroll this neighborhood like you hoped. You needed a plan... or backup. You closed your eyes and tried to focus your mind on getting the attention of anything nearby. It didn't seem to work. You opened your eyes again and studied the mob, looking for a stray or a weak point you could use to attack again.
  
  Suddenly, a loud crashing noise caused the whole mob of humans to turn in your direction. They saw you, and began to advance. Fear shot through your body, and you panicked. You ran back into the house you had just attacked, hiding behind a wall. In the moment it took you to realize what had made the crashing sound, the Hunter had already burst through the trees.
  
  It worked. The Hunter heard your call, and was now effortlessly slashing at the horde of humans. You came back outside, and your senses were overwhelmed at the smell of blood soaking the road and grass. You picked up the bodies the Hunter left in its wake and drank what was left of them. After the rest of the humans had run for the hills, five were dead. You drank their blood and left them out on the road.
  
  You weren't sure if you needed to dismiss the Hunter or something, but it didn't wait for you. It had done its job. It bounded off into the woods, and you wondered if it was the same one that helped you attack the house. You turned back towards the neighborhood and saw the ocean of gore that covered the road. It brought you joy to see this many dead humans, and even more joy when you realized the others were running off into the woods alone, barely armed. They wouldn't last long.
  
  At some point during that night, the cogs of rational thought stopped moving in your brain. You didn't hesitate to kill anymore, and there was no humanity left in you at all. You joined the increasing army of humans turned to slaves, hunting for the Hunters. Within months, the increasing intellect and problem-solving of the Hunters allowed them to kill half the earth's population.
  
  The best part was that you played a very important role. Taken humans began to attack in groups, flushing out groups of humans into the waiting jaws of the Hunters. Soon, the last bastions of humanity were committing mass suicides to avoid being reanimated. The Hunters' job was done, the planet had been repurposed. As humanity disappeared from the face of the earth, you and your undead brothers and sisters wandered empty streets.
  
  The good news was that you had done well. Days on end of relentlessly chasing humans had proven entertaining and fruitful. The bad news was, it was too effective. No humans meant no human blood, and you began to starve. Animal blood was a sorry substitute for the real thing, and soon you ran out of energy. You stopped short and collapsed on the ground. Whatever was left of your former self was gone, this time for good.