The Performance

The drums beat out their eerie rhythm as I stood motionless just behind the huge, ornately carved wooden doors. The cheers and shouts from the gathered crowd in the stands were so loud that they could be heard from where I stood, a hundred meters below. I waited patiently for my cue to go up onto the stage. It would be my finest performance yet and I knew that it would be completely unforgettable.

Strangely, I didn’t feel nervous at all – instead I felt quite the opposite – calm and prepared: I knew what I had to do and I was ready. My co-performer stood just behind me, as still as I was whilst the stage hands ran around nervously making sure that everything was ready and in place. I smiled to myself as I imagined the faces of the crowd when my performance began, their shock and wonder as I went through my routine.

My sleeveless black satin ball gown contrasted beautifully against my pale skin and the tight corset pressed against my chest slightly every time I breathed in. I caught me reflection in the mirror hanging on the wall to my left and I marvelled at the way that my long, ebony hair tumbled in waves across my shoulders, framing my round childlike face. My eyes glittered like freshly cut emeralds, impossibly bright, inhumanly bright, surrounded by my long, ashy lashes. My eyebrows were like brushstrokes perfectly arched over my eyes and my full lips were the breath taking colour of a freshly blossomed pink rose and stood out beautifully against my flawless, marble skin.

I smiled at my reflection, giving it a knowing glance as my pearly white teeth flashed at me from in between my lips. Anybody else would guess my age to be around late teens, possibly early twenties but I knew better – only I knew precisely how long I had looked into mirrors to see that exact same reflection gazing back at me. Only I knew that I hadn’t aged a day or seen sunlight in well over two hundred years and that I could hear a cat sneeze from over a hundred metres away. Only I knew that I wasn’t completely human… but they were all soon going to find out.

I could hear my companion shifting impatiently behind me, eager for the show to begin, but I remained quiet and unmoving, as still as a statue. I could hear his laboured breathing from his lung condition and I could smell his fear and his anger at being scared when he had done this so many times before. I smiled to myself as I heard a hush fall over the crowd and the drums halt for a few minutes whilst I imagined that the Compere stepped up onto the raised podium to give a speech. I listened to his footsteps as they made their way up the wooden stairs just in front of the doors I was currently staring at. I heard a few murmurs of excitement in the crowd as they waited impatiently and shifted in their seats.

“Welcome all,” I heard the voice of the Compere loudly and clearly, as though I was stood right next to him, “before we begin, I would like to hold a minutes silence for all those we have lost in the recent massacre.” Everyone immediately obeyed and all of the whispers that had been passing from person to person immediately ceased. Even the edgy stage hands stopped what they were doing and stood silently.

I counted to thirty in my head before letting a high pitched tinkling laugh escape from my mouth and echo all around the stadium outside, I knew that most people had heard it through the thin walls that surrounded me as they all fidgeted uneasily in their seats. They all however, stayed silent so I let out another girlish giggle as I imagined the Compere up on stage trying to ignore me and mentally urging everyone else in the stands to do the same. I saw the shocked faces of the stage hands as they glanced at me before looking away, scared of what they might see in my both deadly and entrancing eyes.

The attendant behind me place a warning hand on my shoulder briefly before taking it away so fast it almost seemed like he had been electrocuted just from touching me. I laughed again as the smell of fear in the room became much stronger. I chose to stare at the small fifteen year old stage hand in front of me, grinning widely as he glanced at me a couple of times with pure terror written all over his face. When he realised that I wasn’t looking away, he backed away from me slowly before turning and running as fast as he could into the room behind me.

As the respectful silence outside finished, I heard the crowd break out into an uneasy chatter. I concentrated on different conversations in turn and was delighted to hear that most people were talking about me. Rumours were flying around the stands about what I had done and whether or not the sound of laughter had come from where I was hidden underneath the stands.

I tuned out the rest of the Compere’s speech as I waited for the doors in front of me to open. The longer we waited to leave, the more uncomfortable everyone in the room with me became. They were desperate for the show to be over, however, if they knew the changes I had made to the performance they would be cherishing their time cooped up in this small room. I took a deep breath in as I heard the Compere finish his monotonous speech and signal for the stage hands to open the huge doors in front of me.

As the doors were opened, the guard behind me tightened the shackles on my wrists and release the ones that held me to the floor. He gave me a shove as I started walking through the doors and towards the wooden stairs. My black heels echoed against the wood in time to the drums as they began beating once more. The drums sounded like a heartbeat as they echoed around the arena and I could almost hear the spectators’ hearts beating in time with it.

My heart had stopped beaten in the very same moment that I had stopped ageing. I walked proudly up the steps, almost arrogantly as I smiled at the gathered audience and tried to resist the urge to wave, after all – it was unprofessional.

I paused for affect when I reached the top of the stairs before slowly walking towards the Compere who stood centre stage. I stopped directly in front of him and smiled confidently as he took a nervous step backwards, before catching himself and standing up slightly straighter. He took a deep breath to compose himself before speaking authoritatively. “You are charged with the murders of two women and six children, the sentence for these heinous crimes is death by hanging. Do you accept these charges and the respective punishment?” I smiled at him condescendingly as I spoke in my high girlish tone

“Why, of course I do.” I said in a clear, unwavering voice filled with contempt, “What’s the fun of killing them if you’re not going to take the credit for it afterwards?” I heard the shocked gasps and whispers from the crowd as my words sunk in.

“Very well.” The Compere said to me before nodding to the guard behind me. I felt him shift uneasily from one foot to the other as he pulled a long piece of black silk from his belt and tied it over my eyes. I could still see perfectly well through it and I shocked them all by walking straight up to the gallows and standing in front of the noose. I smiled to myself again when the executioner put the noose over my head and tightened it so that it was digging into my neck slightly.

I listened carefully to the sounds of the executioner’s footsteps as he walked towards the lever that would open the trapdoor below me. I heard the wood creak and groan as he stopped next to the handle to wait for the Compere’s signal. I waited, slightly excitedly until the executioner grabbed hold of the lever with both hands and pulled it towards him in one swift motion.

The ground fell out from underneath me and I fell with it, changing as I did so. As I fell my body twisted and shrunk as the bones realigned themselves, transforming into a new shape. My head fell out of the noose that was, by now, larger than my whole body. A tail sprouted from my lower back and my ears slid up to the top of my head, Whiskers grew from my cheeks and fur the same colour as my hair sprouted up all over my body. My fingers shortened and my nails grew into sharp points capable of tearing skin with just a single swipe and I landed on the floor underneath the gallows on all four paws, as a cat.

The shackles landed next me and I swivelled my ears as I heard the shocked, scared and even outraged cries from the stand as I jumped back through the trapdoor and walked towards the middle of the stage with my tail high in the air. I stopped in the middle of the stage and pulled myself up onto my hind legs before transforming back into my human like guise.

I laughed at the shocked expressions on the faces of the audience as I looked up into the stands and smiled at them. “Did you really think that I could be killed so easily?” I asked patronisingly as I met the eyes of everyone in the crowd in turn. “How did you fool yourselves into believing that you could kill me when I have already lived longer than any of you ever will?” I laughed mockingly as every single person seemed to change expression at the same time. They went from shocked and angry to the expression I recognised above all others, my favourite expression, the one I see every time I hunt – fear.

I stood tall, elegant and striking in the middle of the stage as I waited for someone to move or say something, but everyone was frozen like a rabbit which has seen and recognised its predator and yet cannot move for fear of provoking it. I knew that they were all wondering what I was because by now they had all realised that I wasn’t completely human. I laughed again before leaping on top of the gallows in one smooth elegant motion, just to exaggerate how different to them I was.

I crouched on the wood, like a cat that is waiting to pounce as I slowly looked at everyone in the stands, daring them to move or to make a sound. I giggled internally; this was always the most exciting part of the performance – the wait. I waited to see how long it would take someone to move or make a noise and when they did, I would pounce. I extended my sense in all directions as I counted in my head – it never took longer than five minutes for someone to slip up.

Just as I was getting close to four minutes, the Compere took a step towards me angrily, “Just what do you think…” he began before  I pounced, cutting him off mid-sentence as I pushed him over and landed on his chest. “What are you?” he gasped out as I lifted my head back, giving him an almost perfect view of my teeth, or more specifically of my incisors as they grew and sharpened. “What am I?” I asked mockingly as I lowered my face to his neck, “Haven’t you guessed yet?” I paused for dramatic affect. “I am a vampire.” I said slowly, emphasising each word as I leaned down and sank my teeth into his neck. He screamed and tried to throw me off, but I just giggled with my mouth over his neck knowing that I was far too strong for him to be able to move me.

I drank deeply as his struggles got weaker and eventually stopped altogether. I felt the very instant when all life left his body and at that point I stopped drinking, looked up at the crowd who were still too shocked to move and smiled giving them all a good look at my ivory fangs that were dripping with blood. I met the eyes of my guard behind his executioners mask and licked my lips seductively, wiping away all the traces of the Compere’s blood.

I could see the pure terror in his eyes as he took a cautious step backwards. I took a step forward and he took another back, afraid of being too close to me. It became a game to me, a dance with partners in perfect synchrony as I mimicked his steps and he kept retreating. I continued to follow him until his back hit the wall and he dropped into a fighting stance, prepared to go out fighting.

I admired this and decided that instead of killing him, I would change him; I flitted across to him showing off my speed as I moved. I stopped dead in front of him and stared directly into his eyes, knowing that my irises were glowing when I saw the green lights dancing across his face. When his expression went calm, I knew that I had succeeded in hypnotising him, “Sleep.” I whispered in his ear as I caught him and lowered him to the floor.

Finally, I turned my attention back to the crowd who were all watching me in both horror and fascination. I flew back to the centre of the podium and bowed deeply, grinning in anticipation of my show’s finale. “You have all seen what I can do and how fast I can move,” I called addressing the shocked crowd, “I am feeling generous and so have decided to give you a ten second head start to attempt to escape. Run rabbits run!” I shouted the last bit and started laughing as everyone stood up at the same time and began screaming and crying and climbing over each other in an attempt to escape.

“Ten,” I said, beginning the countdown as I watched the chaos erupt around me.

“Nine,” A couple of small children got trampled underfoot as all the adults surged towards the exits.

“Eight,” The screaming got louder as bodies hit the doors I had blocked earlier in the day.

“Seven,” Some people had jumped out of the stands and onto the ground in front of me and were running to try and escape through the doors I had come out of not too long ago.

“Six,” A few people had given up on escape and were instead breaking apart their wooden seats in an attempt to create weapons.

“Five,” I could smell a cocktail of fear, sweat and blood as people got scratched on the wooden doors and on the floor.

“Four,” The people with the crudely made weapons started towards me as a group, intent on stopping me before I finished counting.

“Three,” I could feel my fangs extending and getting even sharper at the thought of all of the fresh blood that was on offer.

“Two,” They were really panicking now and many of the women were hysterical, one woman had curled up on her side in a corner and was crying silently.

“One,” I swept aside the people who were coming towards me with one hand as soon as they got close enough to actually be able to hurt me.

“Zero.” I leapt into the fray and started biting necks and drinking blood as I danced through the crowd as light as air and as deadly as a snake. Nobody would survive. Not even the guard who was going to have to die in order to become like me.

I laughed out loud as I pirouetted through bodies both alive and dead. I had put months of planning into this routine, going through every tiny detail to make sure that it would all be perfect.

It truly was my greatest performance ever.