Three days after giving his blood to Eli, he watched in silent amazement as his brother moved through the abandoned science building with newfound strength and grace. The transformation was complete, and the results exceeded anything he could have anticipated.

  Eli hadn't just survived—he had emerged with abilities matching his own. As dawn approached on that third day, he had prepared to retreat to the windowless b where they had made their temporary shelter. To his shock, Eli had walked directly into a patch of early morning sunlight streaming through a broken window.

  "It doesn't burn," his brother had said with wonder, extending his hands into the golden light. "I thought vampires couldn't..."

  He had stepped forward then, joining Eli in the sunlight. "I can. And now you can too."

  That moment confirmed what he had suspected—his blood had transferred his unique properties to Eli. His brother now possessed the same resistance to sunlight, the same enhanced strength and speed, the same accelerated healing. In the brief tests they had conducted, Eli had demonstrated the ability to outmatch the feral vampires in every respect, just as he could.

  Another difference became apparent when Eli compined of hunger that blood alone didn't satisfy. He had raided the science building's vending machines, devouring packaged snacks with obvious relief.

  "I thought vampires only needed blood," Eli had said between mouthfuls.

  "They do," he had replied, taking a candy bar for himself. "We're different. We need both."

  This was yet another way they diverged from the feral vampires—their bodies required human food in addition to blood. He had discovered this himself during his first weeks after mutation, when blood alone had left him weakened and disoriented until he'd consumed actual food. Now Eli shared this trait as well, further setting them apart from the creatures they had witnessed ravaging the city.

  Yet this apparent miracle brought him no peace. Standing in the shadows of the science building, watching his transformed brother exploring his new capabilities, the weight of his actions crushed down upon him with renewed force. The joy on Eli's face as he discovered each new ability only deepened his own despair.

  He had done this. Not just to Eli, but to the world. His mutation had triggered the vampire apocalypse, his saliva spreading the contagion that now decimated humanity. Cities burned. Nations colpsed. Billions died, only to rise again as predators.

  And now he had irrevocably altered his brother, the one person he had sworn to protect. He had made Eli like himself—perhaps not entirely the same, but changed forever from the human he was meant to be.

  Worst of all, he could feel the vampire network continuing to expand through his strange connection to all those he had created. Each day, millions more joined that terrible web of consciousness. The exponential spread had already reached billions worldwide. Each day, the weight of his responsibility grew heavier.

  He couldn't stay. Not even for Eli. Especially not for Eli.

  The decision crystallized as he watched his brother sleeping that final evening. Eli had adapted to his new existence with remarkable speed, his enhanced body requiring less rest than humans but still needing recovery after the trauma of transformation. In sleep, he looked almost as he had before—the little brother he had raised, protected, sacrificed for.

  Before dawn, he gathered what few supplies they had collected and pced them where Eli would easily find them upon waking. He left nothing for himself. No note, no expnation. What could he possibly say? That he was the architect of humanity's downfall? That he couldn't bear to see the reminder of his sins in his brother's transformed eyes?

  He slipped away while Eli slept, moving with the silence his new form allowed. By sunrise, he had put miles between them, traveling with supernatural speed through the devastated ndscape. He had no destination, no pn beyond putting distance between himself and the st person who connected him to humanity.

  For weeks, he wandered through the ruins of civilization. He avoided both vampires and humans, existing in a liminal space between the species he had once belonged to and the predators he had inadvertently created. He fed when necessary—animals when he could find them, raiding abandoned blood banks when he couldn't. Never humans. Never again. He also scavenged for normal food, another reminder of how he differed from the monsters he had created. While they subsisted on blood alone, he required actual sustenance—a remnant of his humanity that had persisted through his mutation.

  He had crossed into what had once been another state when he encountered the human resistance fighters. A coordinated group, better armed and organized than the scattered survivors he had observed from a distance. They had established a perimeter around a former military instaltion, using salvaged equipment to create defensible positions.

  He knew he should avoid them. Keep his distance as he had from all humans since leaving Eli. But something pulled him toward them—perhaps the desperate need for judgment, for punishment, for someone to hold him accountable for what he had done.

  He approached openly, making no attempt to conceal his nature. They spotted him immediately, of course. Sentries had been posted specifically to watch for his kind.

  The first bullets struck him before he came within a hundred yards of their barricade. He felt the impacts, the momentary pain as his flesh tore, then the immediate healing as his body repaired itself. He continued forward, offering no resistance as more shots found their mark.

  "It's not going down!" someone shouted from the barricade. More gunfire followed, now concentrated and deliberate.

  He stopped walking but made no move to retreat or defend himself. Blood soaked his clothing from dozens of wounds that healed almost as soon as they were inflicted. He stood perfectly still, hands open at his sides, waiting.

  A group of fighters emerged from behind the barricade, approaching with weapons raised. These were not frightened survivors but trained soldiers who had adapted to the new reality. They moved with precision, encircling him with practiced efficiency.

  "It's just standing there," one of them said, voice tight with tension.

  "Some of them are smarter than others," another replied. "Trap, maybe."

  He remained motionless as they closed the circle around him. When one jabbed him with a stun baton, delivering a shock that would have incapacitated any human, he didn't resist. The electrical current caused his muscles to seize momentarily, but his unique physiology recovered almost instantly.

  "What the hell is this one?" the soldier with the baton muttered, backing away.

  An older man approached—clearly a leader from the way the others deferred to him. Grey-haired, face lined with exhaustion and hardened by difficult decisions. He studied the motionless vampire with clinical detachment.

  "Secure it," he ordered finally. "Full containment protocol. If it's not fighting back, we're taking it in for study."

  The soldiers hesitated only briefly before moving to comply. They approached with a restraint device they had clearly designed specifically for vampires—reinforced metal cuffs connected by chains thick enough to resist even supernatural strength.

  He offered no resistance as they bound him, though he could have broken free with minimal effort. When they attached a metal colr around his neck, he simply lowered his head to facilitate the process. The colr was connected to poles held by soldiers on either side, allowing them to control his movements without direct contact.

  "Why isn't it fighting?" one of the younger soldiers asked, clearly unnerved.

  "Don't know, don't care," the leader responded. "Get it inside. The research team will want this one."

  As they led him through the gates of their compound, he caught glimpses of a well-organized operation. Survivors of various backgrounds had come together here, creating something resembling civilization amid the chaos. Laboratories had been established in what had once been administrative buildings. Medical facilities treated the injured. Training grounds prepared more fighters.

  And now they had him—Subject 23, the source of the contagion that had destroyed their world. They didn't know what they had captured. They couldn't understand the connection he had to every vampire they fought. But they would study him, experiment on him, try to understand what he was and how to fight his kind.

  He would let them. It was the closest thing to justice this broken world could offer.

  As they secured him in a reinforced cell deep within the facility, he felt a distant tug at his consciousness—Eli, reaching out through their unique connection. His brother was searching for him, moving through the vampire network with growing skill, trying to locate his missing protector.

  He closed his mind to that connection as best he could. Eli would be better off without him. Everyone would.

  The cell door closed with a heavy metallic sound, and he was left alone in darkness to await whatever came next. For the first time since his mind regained crity, he felt something like peace. Not from forgiveness—there could be none for what he had done—but from the simple certainty that his capture might somehow contribute to humanity's fight against the monsters he had created.

  If his suffering could provide even the smallest aid to their cause, perhaps it would begin to bance the scales. It would never be enough. Nothing could be. But it was something.

  As the sounds of scientific equipment being prepared echoed down the corridor toward his cell, he closed his eyes and waited for his penance to begin.